Budget Resolutions

Greg Smith Excerpts

Thursday 27th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[John Lamont]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The intention may have been to force overseas investors, trust funds and others out of the farming sector, and to attack big landowners, but the tax is doing the complete opposite: it is destroying the family farm sector, forcing tenant farmers out, and seriously impacting on our food security ambitions.

The family farm tax is yet another promise broken by the Chancellor, who gave no indication before the last election that Labour would introduce it. The supermarkets agree: Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Morrisons, the Co-op, Marks & Spencer and many more have expressed their concern about how the tax will impact farmers and our nation’s capacity to produce our own food. I grew up on a farm, so I understand this. The consequences of the Chancellor’s failure to reverse this cruel tax will be catastrophic for our rural communities.

Two weeks ago, I visited dozens of small businesses across the Scottish Borders—corner shops, greengrocers, butchers, manufacturers, gift shops and many more. The same issue came up at almost every single one: the extremely tough business conditions just now. The jobs tax is forcing many of them to delay hiring decisions, or even lay off staff, and the additional red tape is forcing good employers to jump through totally unnecessary hoops. The average cost of a member of staff has surged by almost £1,000 a month, thanks to the jobs tax and the Government’s Employment Rights Bill. To make matters worse, because of the state of the economy, customers have less to spend on goods and services. It is all adding up to be an economic nightmare.

The Chancellor’s decisions are pushing our economy into a tax doom loop: higher taxes will fund more spending, which harms our economic growth and— surprise, surprise—means that the Chancellor receives lower revenue, and so once again comes back to ask for more tax rises.

[Greg Smith (Mid Buckinghamshire) (Con)]

I entirely endorse the argument that my hon. Friend is making. The big punishment in yesterday’s Budget was the increase in taxation on dividends. That says to our wealth creators and entrepreneurs—the people who create jobs—“Don’t bother.”

[John Lamont]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The Budget creates no incentives for people to invest and take the risk of setting up and growing a business. It sends out all the wrong messages about what we want in a country that has traditionally been full of entrepreneurs. Because of the doom loop that the Chancellor has created, it will always be hard-working businesses and families who pay the price for her economic failure.

The Chancellor could have made much better choices in her Budget. She could have saved £47 billion, including £23 billion from welfare, avoiding the need to increase taxes in this way altogether. She could have introduced a cheap power plan to bring down energy costs for homes and businesses. But the Chancellor has not listened. She has not learned from the mistakes she made in last year’s Budget. This Labour Government promised economic stability, but this Budget does nothing to make that a reality, which is why Conservative Members oppose it so strongly.

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[Greg Smith (Mid Buckinghamshire) (Con)]

In reflecting on the title that the Government have offered up for today’s Budget resolutions debate, “Economic Sustainability and Fair Choices”, I have found myself wondering on what planet anyone could possibly call yesterday’s Budget sustainable or fair. The forecasts show that GDP growth will be down in every year from 2026 to 2029, consumer prices index inflation will be up 3.5% this year, taxes will increase by £26 billion, the unemployment rate will hit 4.9% in 2026, the size of the state itself will increase to 44.8% of GDP, borrowing will go up £11 billion, and debt interest will be higher in every year of the forecast. That is not the makings of a sustainable economy or growth, and it is certainly not fair on the taxpayers who will have to shoulder the burden to pay for it all.

As I visit businesses in my constituency—the retailers and hospitality businesses on the high streets of Wendover, Princes Risborough, Great Missenden; the village pubs; the furniture manufacturers in Princes Risborough and the surrounds; and the rocket scientists and big businesses at Westcott venture park—they all paint a picture of preparing for things to get worse. They say that they are not planning to take on new employees or apprentices.

[Graeme Downie]

Did the hon. Gentleman have a similar conversation with his constituents after Liz Truss’s disastrous Budget, which he supported? What did they say?

[Greg Smith]

Labour Members are like a broken record. The last Conservative Government certainly made a number of mistakes—we have put our hands up to that—but we left employment high and unemployment at a record low, and jobs were being created every single day.

Now, businesses are not taking on—or are planning not to take on—more new starters, or, like Rumsey’s Chocolaterie on Wendover High Street, have already had to lay people off or cut their hours because of employer NI, business rates and the looming Employment Rights Bill. Those are the real-world consequences of the Labour Government’s policies. The dividends tax in the Budget struck right at the heart of the entrepreneurs—the small business owners—who risk everything to create growth, employ people and create the jobs that we want in our economy. It has sent them the message: “There will be less in it for you, if anything at all.” Many of those businesses operate on narrow margins, working their socks off almost for nothing, and this Government are making it even harder for them. That is no way to run an economy.

I am lucky enough to have many farmers in my constituency of Mid Buckinghamshire, where around 90% of the land is agricultural, and I talk to them as often as I can. My party held an emergency food and farming summit at Fleet Marston farm in my constituency a couple of weeks ago, where my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition, the shadow Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my right hon. Friend the Member for Louth and Horncastle (Victoria Atkins), and the shadow Farming Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley and Ilkley (Robbie Moore), joined me to again hear directly from farmers about the impact the family farm tax will have. They will have to either sell up to a third of their farm to meet that tax bill or take on a level of debt that it will take over 40 years to pay back.

The National Farmers Union, many other organisations and farmers directly have tried to reach out, including yesterday on Whitehall, to get Labour MPs and Ministers to listen and understand the real-world consequences of their decisions. And yet the Budget yesterday was entirely lacking anything other than the transferable allowance to take away the stress, anxiety and existential threat to British agriculture that the family farm tax and changes to business property relief represent to family businesses and family farms up and down the country. I can assure anyone who challenges the point I am making that it will not be other farmers who buy the land when farms have to sell to meet the inheritance tax bill—it will be property developers and those with all sorts of other concerns, who will not keep that land in food production. The nation’s food security will suffer as a direct result of the failure to scrap the family farm tax yesterday.

I want to talk briefly about another issue I have been focused on for a number of years, during the last Parliament and this one. I draw the House’s attention to my co-chairmanship of the loan charge and taxpayer fairness all-party parliamentary group. I am grateful to the Chief Secretary to the Treasury and the new Exchequer Secretary for the time they have taken to reach out on this issue. Some of the announcements yesterday were welcome, off the back of the McCann review. However, I am sorry to say to the House that they have not been met with total joy from the victims of the loan charge, because many people caught up in the loan charge are still being asked to pay amounts of money that they simply cannot afford.

The Chancellor, the Chief Secretary to the Treasury and other Ministers are on the record saying, when in opposition, that the victims of the loan charge were “victims of mis-selling” and that the perpetrators—those who promoted these schemes—should have been brought to justice. What we got yesterday was nothing of the sort. We did not get the fully independent review that the APPG and the Loan Charge Action Group have been calling for.

Despite the concessions yesterday, many people simply will not be able to pay. Two thirds of the victims are now over 55, 40% are over 60 and a quarter are already retired. They just do not have the ability to find the amounts of money being asked for, and the offer on the table is nothing like the settlement made with the big banks some years ago, which was in the region of 10% to 15%. I urge the Exchequer Secretary to look at this again and to deliver a genuinely fair settlement to everyone caught up by the loan charge and pursue those who sold the schemes.

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[Anna Gelderd (South East Cornwall) (Lab)]

This Budget sets out fair decisions that benefit communities across the country that have felt the strain of the last decade, and that expect to see the change that they voted for delivered, and the cost of living brought under control.

I am delighted that Cornwall’s potential has been recognised with the new £30 million Kernow industrial growth fund. This new fund demonstrates that Cornwall once again has a leading role to play in powering the UK economy. Mining is at the heart of our story in Cornwall. With the new support, we can begin the next chapter, in which critical minerals and other core industries will help us to unlock the next great industrial revolution, and greener, cheaper energy. The fund will support local businesses and workers. That investment is combined with the stability that will come through extended business rate retention, and sits alongside wider opportunities offered through the National Wealth Fund, the British Business Bank and Great British Energy. These choices support secure, year-round jobs, and this combination of investment, stability and real change for the majority of working people is reflected throughout the Budget

South East Cornwall will feel a benefit through local growth and to family finances. Families gain real support. Wages have risen faster in the first year of this Government than they did over the past decade. The reduction in energy bills and the freeze to prescription charges, fuel duty and rail fares will be welcomed by my residents in South East Cornwall. The changes to universal credit will bring thousands back into work, strengthening labour markets in places like Liskeard, Torpoint and Callington.

One of the most significant steps is the decision to scrap the two-child benefit limit. Shockingly, child poverty rose by 900,000 between 2010 and 2024. I say “shockingly”, but I am not sure if that truly shocks the Conservatives, who presided over that decline. I know what child poverty looks like. I know how it locks people out of opportunities through no fault of their own, and I know how hard schools, campaigners, charities and other support systems work to try to bridge the gap, but some gaps require systemic change. This Budget will lift 450,000 children out of poverty. That is what systemic change under this Labour Government looks like.

In South East Cornwall, relative child poverty stood at 21.7% in 2023, meaning that almost a quarter of our local children entered school already facing hardship. Growing up in poverty makes people less likely to be in work, and more likely to earn 25% less, aged 30, so that is not good for kids or for the adults they become, and it is not good for our economy. This Budget reduces pressure and gives families a more secure start.

For too long, local healthcare has been a challenge for residents in South East Cornwall, so I am pleased that Labour is backing our NHS with extra support. Investment in healthcare technology and the creation of 250 neighbourhood health centres will cut waiting lists and improve access. The NHS neighbourhood rebuild opens up more than 120 new centres by 2030, and there will be improvements at Truro health park. That is backed by real investment; these are not fantasy priorities. Residents in South East Cornwall rely on services in both Cornwall and Plymouth, and these upgrades will bring benefits right across my region.

Young people get new opportunities as well. Investment in school libraries and new playgrounds will improve learning and wellbeing, and there will be an £820 million investment to support young people by guaranteeing them a place in college, an apprenticeship or personalised job support. The free apprenticeship training for under 25s in small businesses will help local employers across South East Cornwall. That is 1,854 small and medium-sized enterprises in my region that will be able to train and retain young people. This is a real chance to build a local, skilled workforce and to keep that talent at home in Cornwall.

Cornwall needs the tools to strengthen its visitor economy in a way that benefits our local people in the long term, so an overnight visitor levy could be an important step. We rely heavily on tourism, yet residents often feel the pressure of the summer peaks without seeing the long-term benefits, so the power to raise local revenue and reinvest in our community projects could create a fairer balance and support a more resilient local economy.

I also welcome the new announcement for farmers and their families. The ability for spouses to transfer any unused agricultural and business property relief allowances gives farming families more certainty as they plan for their future. South East Cornwall is a proud rural and coastal constituency, and I have been working with many local farmers to ensure that their views are heard in my discussions with Ministers. Fixing thresholds and closing loopholes strengthens confidence, but I know there is further work to do.

[Greg Smith]

While the spousal transfer is a very narrow measure that might give a couple of years or maybe a decade’s relief, at the end of the day farmers will still have to sell massive chunks of their farm to meet the inheritance tax bill. What will the hon. Lady say to her farmers when that point comes?

[Anna Gelderd]

I thank the hon. Member for allowing me more time to make my points. Farming is at the heart of my community—

[Greg Smith]

Answer the question! This is a debate.

[Anna Gelderd]

I know, and I am very glad to be debating with the hon. Member on this point. Farming is at the heart of my community, and I am working hard with Ministers to ensure that the new changes are reflected. As I have said, there is much more work to do.

I particularly welcome the clear recognition of Cornwall in this Budget. Alongside the Kernow industrial growth fund, the Government’s commitment to work with the Council of Europe to increase the UK’s formal recognition of the Cornish language under the European charter for regional or minority languages matters, because Kernewek remains at a lower level of protection compared with other Celtic languages. That is why I introduced my ten-minute rule Bill focused on Cornish language and heritage.

Opposition parties talk about leaving the European convention on human rights. Cornwall fought hard for our national minority status and the frameworks that protect our language and heritage, so I do not want to see them thrown away. I want to see a wider use of Kernewek in signage and place names, which I know will boost our local economy as visitors flock to see it.

This Budget moves us in the right direction. It does not complete the work, but it delivers a fair step towards repairing Britain and rebuilding the opportunities in places such as South East Cornwall. I will continue working, as I have done since being elected, to deliver real investment, strong public services and a local economy that works year-round.

Winter Fuel Payment

Greg Smith Excerpts

Monday 9th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Torsten Bell]

I can clear that up, in the case of the Liberal Democrats and Reform. They have the same policy—not for the first time, I might add—which is definitely to give winter fuel payments to millionaires. I have no idea what the position of the Conservative party is, and I have been here for an hour and a quarter. Actually, I have been in the House for the last 11 months, and I have still not been able to fathom what the Conservative party’s policy is, but I think it is to not learn any lesson from Liz Truss.

[Greg Smith (Mid Buckinghamshire) (Con)]

During the general election campaign, that well-known political giant, “a Labour spokesman”, said that Labour had no plans to change the winter fuel payment, but within weeks, the Government had cruelly cut it, withdrawing it from millions of pensioners, and 13 months later, the Minister is performing this screeching U-turn. Given the hokey-cokey nature of this policy, can he give an assurance from the Dispatch Box that what he is announcing will apply not just this winter, but every winter in this Parliament?

[Torsten Bell]

The point about certainty for pensioners is important—I think that is the point the hon. Gentleman is making. As I said earlier, we are setting the £35,000 threshold so that people become aware of it in the coming months. It is a round number, and we do not intend to change it in the years ahead, although further in the future, yes, there will be questions about uprating, which will be considered in the normal way.

Oral Answers to Questions

Greg Smith Excerpts

Monday 12th May 2025 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Western]

I of course agree with my hon. Friend, about both the benefits of the youth guarantee and the specific impact of the fair repayment rate, which across the country will support 1.2 million of the poorest families, including 700,000 families with children.

[Greg Smith (Mid Buckinghamshire) (Con)]

T2. If she will make a statement on her departmental responsibilities.

[The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Liz Kendall)]

Since our last Question Time, Work and Pensions Ministers and local leaders have launched eight of our 17 Get Britain Working trailblazer programmes across the UK, backed by £240 million of additional investment. These include South Yorkshire’s brilliant plans to get people back to health and back to work; five trailblazers in London, including specialist support for young care leavers and those with musculoskeletal conditions; joining up health and employment support in Blaenau Gwent, Denbighshire and Neath Port Talbot in Wales; and our youth guarantee in Cambridgeshire and Peterborough. There is still much more that we need to do, but we have already made real progress in unlocking people’s potential and getting Britain working and growing again.

[Greg Smith]

One of my constituents is experiencing severe delays in getting Access to Work scheme payments, dating back to February. In correspondence with the Department, a letter openly says there is no long-term solution to that, so when will the Secretary of State come forward with a long-term solution to speed up these payments?

[Liz Kendall]

I really thank the hon. Gentleman for his question, and we do actually have a plan right now. It was announced in our Green Paper that we are going to reform Access to Work. It is a brilliant support, with a grant or money to help people with physical aids and adaptations, and other support, to get work and to stay in work. I would encourage him to input into the review, and either I or my right hon. Friend the Minister for Social Security and Disability would be more than happy to meet him to hear his views about how we can make this work for his constituent.

Income Tax (Charge)

Greg Smith Excerpts

Monday 4th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Greg Smith (Mid Buckinghamshire) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for North Somerset (Sadik Al-Hassan) on a powerfully delivered maiden speech and wish him well in this House. I thank him for his kind words about his predecessor, Dr Liam Fox, who was a true champion of this House.

The Budget of broken promises came as a hammer blow to communities up and down the land, but before I get into the detail of that, and in the interest of balance and fairness, I would like to thank the Chancellor for one of the measures in it. Following FairFuelUK’s campaign, The Sun’s “Keep It Down” campaign, and indeed, the campaign led by my hon. Friend the Member for Meriden and Solihull East (Saqib Bhatti), the freeze on fuel duty, which the last Conservative Government implemented for so many years, will continue. It is very apparent to me that petrol and diesel are overtaxed as it is, and working people up and down the land absolutely depend on being able to afford a tank of fuel to get the kids to school, go to work and go about their daily lives. As a request ahead of next year’s Budget, I ask the Chancellor to consider fixing a double taxation in the system: the point at which VAT is applied to petrol and diesel. At the moment, it is applied after fuel duty, rather than before; we therefore pay VAT not just on the petrol and diesel itself, but on the fuel duty that has been put on top of it.

There is so much to dislike in this Budget of broken promises, beginning with the increase in employers’ national insurance contributions, which is a direct tax on jobs. It is a tax on small and large businesses alike, and it is a tax on our general practitioners—I am sure I am not alone in this House in already having correspondence on this issue with many of the GPs in my constituency. There is the perversity of putting bus fares up to £3, scrapping the Conservatives’ £2 bus fare cap. Working people up and down the land rely on buses; it is only in Labour’s world that putting the bus fare up means getting more people to work. The £40 billion tax hike is going to lead to higher inflation, lower wages and increased Government debt.

For my constituency of Mid Buckinghamshire, though, the very worst part of this Budget was the full-frontal attack on our farmers and agricultural communities. The changes to agricultural property relief will cause family farms up and down the land to have to sell such a huge proportion of their farm in order to meet that tax bill that those farms themselves may well become unviable.

[Jim Shannon]

I commend the hon. Gentleman on that comment. Every farmer in Northern Ireland will be impacted by this change. The Ulster Farmers’ Union—I declare an interest as a member—has said that the change is universally discredited and universally opposed. The threshold for agricultural relief for farms should have been higher—perhaps £4 million or £5 million, not £1 million, which brings everybody into the equation.

[Greg Smith]

As ever, the hon. Gentleman has hit the nail exactly on the head. In its briefing, which I am sure all Members have received, the National Farmers Union points out that the Treasury’s own figures on who will get caught up in the APR changes are fundamentally wrong, because they include a lot of very small-scale areas—perhaps a private residence with one or two fields or a very small number of livestock. That is not what any of us would define as a working farm. In reality, when all those family farms are brought into the numbers, the vast majority of our food producers who contribute to food supply chains will get caught up in those changes.

When the Chancellor was on the BBC on Sunday morning, she said that the individual claim for agricultural property relief is now £1 million, but if a farm is owned by two people, that allowance could be transferred to the other person. Some confusion needs to be ironed out here, because unlike the nil-rate band and residential nil-rate band, the policy paper entitled “Summary of reforms to agricultural property relief and business property relief” published on 30 October this year states that

“any unused allowance will not be transferable between spouses and civil partners.”

Perhaps in summing up the Minister can clear up that confusion caused by the Chancellor on the Kuenssberg show.

The APR changes are not the only changes that will hammer our farming families and agricultural communities. I am sure there is a joke somewhere along the lines of “When is a pick-up truck not a pick-up truck?”, but it is no laughing matter for farmers. For them, it is just a basic bit of equipment that they need to operate, but this Government are hammering them on the cost of that equipment if it happens to have rear seats. As I raised earlier today in this House during the urgent question, the Government’s carbon tax will put up the price of fertiliser by between £50 and £75 a tonne. Either that is going to have a direct impact on the cost of food, or the Government are asking farmers—already operating on incredibly tight margins, often with no profit at all—just to swallow that extra cost. I urge them to reconsider.

Other measures in the Budget that are clearly wrong and the Government must U-turn on include VAT on private school fees. The vast majority of parents I talk to in my constituency who choose to send their children to independent schools scrimp and save and make sacrifices in order to give their children that opportunity. An additional 20% in fees makes that unaffordable for those parents, and when I talk to representatives of independent schools in my constituency some are saying that they can see a path to having to close their doors. I know that a lot of Labour Members would probably quite like that outcome, but the reality is that it will be denying children opportunity and denying parents choice, and it will have the knock-on impact of class sizes in my kids’ school—and, I am sure, every other hon. Member’s kids’ school in the state sector—going up. That will cause overcrowding and put pressure on our state schools. This is all before I come on to the other problems in this Budget, not least the cruel attack on our pensioners through the withdrawal of the winter fuel payment.

Lastly, just to prove how bizarre and simply unserious the Government are about value for money, they have chosen someone as their new value-for-money tsar who is inextricably linked to one of the most inefficient and wasteful projects ever to come out of the British state: HS2. How on earth can someone so linked to that project be considered an arbiter of value for money?

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)]

We now come to another maiden speech. I call Andrew Ranger.

Oral Answers to Questions

Greg Smith Excerpts

Monday 18th March 2024 Commons Chamber

[Greg Smith (Buckingham) (Con)]

10. What steps his Department is taking to support pensioners.

[Mr Louie French (Old Bexley and Sidcup) (Con)]

19. What steps his Department is taking to support pensioners.

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[Paul Maynard]

I am grateful for that question. The answer could not be further from nothing. This is a Government with a proven track record of supporting pensioners, including our commitment to the triple lock. In April we will see the state pension raised by 8.5% this year, after an increase of 10.1% last year, meaning that it will be a full £3,200 higher in cash terms than it was in 2010.

[Greg Smith]

I very much welcome the record on supporting pensioners that my hon. Friend has just outlined. A number of pensioners in my constituency have contacted me about the effects of fiscal drag—they may have a very modest private pension that is now being dragged into tax when they never expected it to be. What steps is my hon. Friend taking in conjunction with the Treasury to ensure that we can get pensioners on modest private pensions out of tax?

[Paul Maynard]

This is the Government who have nearly doubled the personal allowance since 2010, ensuring that most of the lowest earners do not pay income tax. Indeed, thanks to the personal allowance, around 30% of individuals do not pay tax, and of course any pensioner solely reliant on the state pension does not pay income tax.

Oral Answers to Questions

Greg Smith Excerpts

Monday 18th December 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Louie French (Old Bexley and Sidcup) (Con)]

3. What steps his Department is taking to support the long-term unemployed into work.

[Greg Smith (Buckingham) (Con)]

7. What steps his Department is taking to support the long-term unemployed into work.

[The Minister for Employment (Jo Churchill)]

It is a pleasure to be back, Mr Speaker. We are delivering a suite of measures as part of the back to work plan, supporting customers on their journey to employment. That is focused on developing skills and building confidence through interventions such as the restart scheme. We are working across Government to support those with health conditions get back to work, with programmes such as our WorkWell service.

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[Jo Churchill]

I thank my hon. Friend because he speaks perfectly for those of us across the Conservative family. Work is positive, a force for good, and the system should be fair to the taxpayer and the claimant, with checks and balances. It is right that, on average, those in work are some £6,000 better off per year. Universal credit was introduced and further rolled out because it is a welfare system that makes work pay.

[Greg Smith]

Skills are clearly key to supporting the long-term unemployed to find work. Buckinghamshire Council is launching a series of skills bootcamps, targeted at the long-term unemployed. For example, one bootcamp will provide construction skills, including a construction skills certification scheme card, plus support to reach self-employment and wraparound support on how to set up a company. Will my hon. Friend congratulate Buckinghamshire Council on that initiative, and say what more she can do to ensure that those who need to upgrade their skills base are able to do so?

[Jo Churchill]

I am delighted to congratulate not only Buckinghamshire Council but my hon. Friend on the fantastic work he does in his constituency. Upskilling jobseekers, particularly in areas such as construction where we need more domestic workers, is vital. The Department for Work and Pensions continues to support individuals into employment through back to work programmes such as the restart scheme, which provides tailored training programmes and sector-based work academy programmes similar to those mentioned by my hon. Friend. It offers training, work placements, and guaranteed job interviews, and I am committed to exploring what more can be done.

Oral Answers to Questions

Greg Smith Excerpts

Monday 13th November 2023 Commons Chamber

[Tom Pursglove]

What I can say to the hon. Gentleman is that no decisions have been made. It is right and proper that the consultation responses are properly considered in the normal way. I would be happy to meet with Parkinson’s UK again; I met it previously, and it is an important stakeholder for the Department. We do think it is right that we look at the work capability assessment and review it periodically, not least because of the changes we have seen in homeworking and flexible working in recent years.

[Greg Smith (Buckingham) (Con)]

16. What steps his Department is taking to support more parents into work.

[The Minister for Employment (Guy Opperman)]

There have been transformational changes in childcare, skills, training and support for future employers, as announced at the spring Budget. It is absolutely the case that from April 2024, eligible working parents of two-year-olds will be able to access 15 hours of free childcare per week from the term after the second birthday, plus there will be the delivery of more support for working parents of children over the age of nine months with 30 free hours of childcare. There is nowhere in the world that compares with our childcare offer on an ongoing basis. We have virtually Scandinavian levels.

[Greg Smith]

I am a huge supporter of the bold action that the Government are taking to tackle the costs of childcare and get more parents into work. However, some settings in my constituency report that the rate the Government pay does not cover the full costs of providing that place, putting them in an untenable position. Can my hon. Friend work with me, alongside the Department for Education, to ensure that the scheme is fully working and that the childcare places are actually there to be able to take up this generous Government support?

[Guy Opperman]

I am happy to convene a summit with the Department for Education, my hon. Friend and his unitary authority to discuss the ways in which we are ensuring that. We are already working in partnership with the DFE to deliver this campaign, and clearly the Government are committed to ensuring that the implementation of the expansion to 30 hours is dealt with in an appropriate and seamless way.

Oral Answers to Questions

Greg Smith Excerpts

Monday 5th December 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mark Pawsey (Rugby) (Con)]

7. What assessment he has made of the potential merits of reducing the universal credit taper rate on the levels of people’s incomes.

[Greg Smith (Buckingham) (Con)]

11. What assessment he has made of the potential merits of reducing the universal credit taper rate on the levels of people’s incomes.

[The Minister for Employment (Guy Opperman)]

We reduced the earnings taper to 55% last December and we increased the work allowance by £500 a year. As a consequence, 1.7 million households will benefit from these measures, which mean that they keep, on average, around an extra £1,000 a year. That encourages in-work progression as claimants are clearly better off in work.

[Guy Opperman]

My hon. Friend will be aware that Rugby jobcentre is doing a fantastic job locally; I look forward to visiting in 2023. Since April 2022, we have been rolling out the new in-work progression offer, which will support approximately 2.1 million working universal credit claimants to progress into higher-paid work. They will also be supported by progression champions, of whom we have 37 across the country, including in Mercia.

[Greg Smith]

Universal credit was always intended to ensure that work pays. Reducing the taper rate is a critical part of that, but does my hon. Friend agree that it is not the only critical element? To keep unemployment as low as it is today or lower, things like increasing access to work coaches are equally important.

[Guy Opperman]

A huge amount is being done to increase the time that individual claimants spend with work coaches. More intensive support is being provided. The additional earnings threshold, which my hon. Friend will be fully aware of, is also being rolled out across the country to ensure that we see claimants in better-paid jobs on a longer-term basis.

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[Mel Stride]

On assisting the disabled into employment, this Government have an excellent record through Disability Confident. Our work coaches do a huge amount of work to ensure that those with disabilities are in work. The right hon. Gentleman will know the Department is currently undertaking a large amount of work on economic inactivity. I heard his recent comments, which were very interesting, and my door is always open to conversations about working together.

[Greg Smith (Buckingham) (Con)]

T2. Research by Macmillan shows that 83% of people with a cancer diagnosis experience a financial impact from that, with the average figure being £891 a month on top of their usual expenditure, which sometimes means they cannot afford to get to their medical appointments. What more can be done to ensure that those with a cancer diagnosis get rapid access to everything to which they are entitled?

[The Minister for Disabled People, Health and Work (Tom Pursglove)]

I thank my hon. Friend for raising this point. The experience he describes illustrates the troubling and worrying times for families when a diagnosis of cancer comes through. We are committed to ensuring that people can access financial support, through the personal independence payment and other benefits for which they are eligible, in a timely manner. We are seeing a gradual improvement on PIP claims, with the latest statistics showing that the average end-to-end journey has steadily reduced from 26 weeks in August 2021 to 18 weeks at the end of July 2022. However, I am not complacent on this; digitisation clearly plays an important part and we are going to go further.

Oral Answers to Questions

Greg Smith Excerpts

Monday 8th November 2021 Commons Chamber

The Secretary of State was asked—

[Greg Smith (Buckingham) (Con)]

1. What steps she is taking to ensure that the household support fund helps the most vulnerable during winter 2021-22.

[The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Dr Thérèse Coffey)]

We have made £500 million available across the UK to support vulnerable households this winter. It really is for local authorities, which are closer to their communities, to use the funding to support those with needs for food, utilities and wider essentials. They are best placed to design schemes that support those most in need locally.

[Greg Smith]

The £500 million household support fund is extremely welcome and my local council is busy ensuring that support reaches those who need it through their excellent Helping Hand scheme. Will my right hon. Friend join me in congratulating Buckinghamshire Council on ensuring that a comprehensive package is available for those who are sadly unable to put food on the table or heat their homes, and will she set out what more can be done to ensure that those in such distressing circumstances know that local authorities have the resources and should be the first port of call?

[Dr Coffey]

My hon. Friend is right to praise Buckinghamshire Council, which was allocated £2.4 million from the fund. It is fair to say that local authorities delivering the household support fund have access to elements relating to health visitors, social workers and housing departments, and access to the benefits system through the Searchlight portal, to identify people who may need help at this time and are most in need. Of course, people should turn to their councils for that support, and they should be warmly welcomed.

Oral Answers to Questions

Greg Smith Excerpts

Monday 28th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

We now come to topical questions.

[Greg Smith (Buckingham) (Con)]

If she will make a statement on her departmental responsibilities.

[The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions (Dr Thérèse Coffey)]

Mr Speaker, I was really looking forward to answering Question 35, from the hon. Member for Edinburgh West (Christine Jardine), but that is okay.

[Dr Coffey]

Well, there we are. By the way, Christine, the answer is none.

On the topical statement, on the basis of a successful G7, at which the employers taskforce fed into the discussions about work, I was able to participate in the G20 last week in Italy, as well as work on the OECD in terms of some of the work we want to do to make sure that, as a world, when we build back better we share and collaborate, because we want to make sure that we build back fairer and greener. I am particularly excited about the opportunities to help people with health conditions and disability to re-enter the world of work.

[Greg Smith]

Increasingly sophisticated digital skills are ever more crucial for those seeking work. With that in mind, what steps is my right hon. Friend taking to help all universal credit claimants to improve and strengthen their digital skills as they seek work?

[Dr Coffey]

I am conscious that digital inclusion is a key part of the skills issue. We are working collaboratively with the DFE, particularly on digital boot camps, and we have even changed the rules of aspects of universal credit to make sure that people can fully participate in extended courses. We will continue to use and signpost people to whatever resources are available.