Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation

Heidi Alexander Excerpts

Friday 22nd March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Heidi Alexander (Lewisham East) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to follow two excellent speeches from fellow female Labour London MPs. The hon. Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg) said that households should now be able to afford to spend. That might be the case for his constituents, but it is not the case for mine. It certainly does not feel that way to them, as they struggle hard to make ends meet on a daily basis.

I want to focus on the importance of jobs and of getting people back to work, and I will pick up on the proposed child care scheme. Two things in particular struck me about Wednesday’s Budget, the first being the level of complacency among the Government about the economic challenges facing the country and the second, no less concerning, being the lack of imagination, leadership and vision in coming up with solutions to get our economy moving and get to people into work.

While thinking about what to say, I read the transcript of the last two days’ Budget debate. The speeches fell into two categories. Government Members welcomed initiatives such as the 1p cut in beer tax and the cancelled rise in fuel duty—all fine, as far as it goes—and Opposition Members talked about the tough reality of their constituents’ lives, about people struggling to make ends meet and to find or stay in work. Government Members would then attack us, claiming that we were talking our country down. I ask myself, “What underlies this difference between the speeches?” There might be an element of political point scoring or a desire to get a headline, but in truth—perhaps I am being too generous—we all see our country through different eyes.

Our stagnating, flatlining economy affects different parts of the country dramatically differently. When the Chancellor and the Prime Minister slap each other on the back about private sector job creation, I realise that they do not see the queues outside their local jobcentres that I see every week. When the Chancellor argues against capping bankers’ bonuses, I realise that he does not immediately think, as I do, “Hang on a minute. There are hundreds of bankers in this country who will earn more in one year than my father will earn in his lifetime.” When he proposes a scheme to help people buy second homes, I realise he will not be sat in an advice surgery this afternoon, listening to people so far from being able to afford to buy a home, that all they say to me is that they just want to be able to rent a decent property at a price they can afford.

I see little in the Budget that will bring genuine hope to my constituents, particularly those already paying the heaviest price for the mistakes of others. Last month, in Lewisham East, 3,517 people were claiming jobseeker’s allowance, which compares with about 900 in the Prime Minister’s constituency. There are 500 more people on the dole in my constituency than there were in 2010, and youth unemployment and long-term unemployment are up. So where was the good news for those people on Wednesday? The Government have at least listened to the Opposition’s calls for national insurance reductions for small and medium-sized businesses—and about time too—but where is the vision for the jobs of the future?

The Government pay lip service to creating a low-carbon economy, but then fundamentally undermine investment in renewables with other decisions, whether on feed-in tariffs or planning policy. When they talk about removing barriers to work, such as the sky-high costs of child care, they say, “Sorry, you have to wait two and a half years until we introduce it.”

Anything to help people with child care costs is welcome, but it has to be seen in the context of real-terms cuts to tax credits and maternity pay. It is a case of giving with one hand and taking away with the other. According to a Daycare Trust survey, child care costs—whether for nursery care, childminders or after-school clubs—have risen by over 5% in the last year. In London, nursery costs for children under two are 25% higher than elsewhere in the country. In fact, the average cost for nursery care of this sort is £5 an hour, so a full-time working mum buying 50 hours of nursery care a week has to find £14,000 a year. No wonder people say it is like having a second mortgage. Will the Minister say how far the new child care scheme will make inroads into the costs that parents have to pay? How do we know that it will not just drive up prices further? How much of this money is actually new? Child care is one of the biggest barriers to accessing the limited jobs that exist. When I speak to my constituents—by and large, people who are desperate to get back into work—it is clear that what they need is real help with meeting these costs.

The Government’s policies are hurting people. They are not working. Unfortunately, this year’s Budget is too little, too late. The sooner we have a general election and those of us on this side of the House can be in government, the better it will be for my constituents and the country.