Thomas Cook

Debate between Grant Shapps and Alison McGovern

Wednesday 25th September 2019 Commons Chamber

[Grant Shapps]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right: there are very profitable parts of this sector. One large British airline has just made record profits, which shows that there is money to be made in the sector. However, I would not want to be in the position of dictating to the sector how it runs its businesses—some will succeed, and some will not. What I am passionately interested in is that, when they do go wrong, as has been discussed, the problems do not fall on the taxpayer’s shoulders.

[Alison McGovern (Wirral South) (Lab)]

I can tell the Secretary of State that my constituents are not happy with the Government’s response. However, at the heart of this problem is a company that was signed off by auditors last year. The Government know that the audit system is not working well, and they had the Kingman review look into this issue and make recommendations. In terms of the cross-Government arrangements the Secretary of State is speaking about, what have the Government done to reform audit, alongside the recommendations that they themselves asked for?

Local Government Financing

Debate between Grant Shapps and Alison McGovern

Tuesday 29th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Grant Shapps]

I will come in a moment to the RDAs that were set up by Lord Prescott. In the meantime, I can tell the right hon. Gentleman that this is a new £1 billion—the regional development fund £1 billion announced in last week’s Budget and designed to help— [Interruption.] Labour Members do not want to hear about this, but it is designed to help in exactly the kind of constituencies that they have come here today to complain are being underfunded. They do not want to know that this coalition Government are doing something to help those areas. That is the truth.

We live in grave financial times, and the previous Government bequeathed a scorched-earth policy. As Labour’s departing Chief Secretary declared, “I’m afraid there’s no money left. Good luck.” [Interruption.] They do not want to hear that either, but it was what the note said, and it also happened to be true.

We inherited spending commitments funded by a litany of IOUs scrawled on the back of fag packets and a toxic legacy of debt from an Administration who went on a spending spree with the nation’s credit card. Our most immediate priority is therefore to reduce the nation’s chronic public spending deficit to pave the way for economic recovery.

[Alison McGovern (Wirral South) (Lab)]

The hon. Gentleman describes again this picture of deals scrawled on the back of fag packets. Would he like to make a comment to my constituents in Wirral who work for companies that spent a great deal of time working hand in glove with the RDA and the Government to protect our local economy and have been thrown into disarray by the policy being made on the hoof by the new Government? I will listen to anything the Minister has to say that will help us protect our local economy, and I will be grateful for his comments.

[Grant Shapps]

I welcome the hon. Lady’s intervention. She was not here in the last Parliament, but had she been she might have read our green paper, which describes in detail our plans for the RDAs. Labour Members seem to think that when there is a change of Government, policies should just roll on even if they have not worked. The RDAs were a case in point, of policies that cost a lot of money and got us nowhere.

The prospect of paying £70 billion in debt interest is of deep concern, but apparently not on the Opposition Benches, where it is as if the money has not run out, the party is not over and we can just carry on spending imaginary funds. That £70 billion in debt repayments is more money than the council tax, business rates, stamp duty and the inheritance tax collect put together. That is the size of the deficit we are up against. So we need to tighten our belts. Ministers are cutting their pay, and it is also fair to ask local authorities to pay their part towards the £6.2 billion public sector savings required this year.