Iain McKenzie
Main Page: Iain McKenzie (Labour - Inverclyde)
Mr Iain McKenzie (Inverclyde) (Lab)
As we have heard throughout this debate, times are hard and the cost of living across the country seems to keep rising. The Queen’s Speech is further evidence, as if we needed it, that the Government are increasingly incapable of making positive changes to the cost of living for hard-pressed families.
Prices are still going up faster than wages for those who are fortunate enough to be employed and we are all aware of the unacceptable levels of unemployment across the UK. Yet we continue to witness banks paying out bonuses while families struggle. It is therefore not surprising that most people feel that nothing is changing for them, and the Government seem intent on following a failing economic plan—a plan that, bizarrely, asks millions of families and pensioners to pay more, while 14,000 millionaires are given a tax cut of more than £40,000 each. Many of my constituents find that quite unbelievable in the face of plummeting living standards for most people in the country.
Across my constituency, families, pensioners and businesses are struggling. They have told me so time and again. People tell me of their shock during their weekly visit to the supermarket, when they find less in their basket and more money going into the till. I witness more and more families having to go to greater lengths to keep within their budget for food, desperately shopping around to track down bargains on the most basic of food items. Those who cannot make it from week to week have the food banks. Frighteningly, the number of people going to food banks continues to rise.
Families are losing their tax credits. Some 84,000 families in Scotland are set to lose an average of £511 a year. That is money that they would have spent in the local economy on essentials such as food and clothing. Families across Scotland will lose £43 million a year from cuts to tax credits. That is an enormous amount to take out of the Scottish economy. Fuel bills are horrendous. An increasing number of people are having to choose between food and fuel because they cannot afford both. Families in this country are facing an unprecedented assault on their living standards.
The granny tax will hit hundreds of thousands of pensioners in the UK and 400,000 pensioners in Scotland. Pensioners will face an average income tax hike of £83 a year by 2015-16. We all know the impact that will have.
To date, there is little in the Government’s programme that will help those who need it most. It has been pain all the way, hurting working people, families, pensioners and even the disabled. They are all finding it difficult to make ends meet. Since the last election, average energy bills have gone up by £300 a year, and the Government need to address the soaring cost of living, particularly rising electricity prices. Families are under severe pressure to afford the basics in life, such as heating their home. During the past year most bills have ballooned, such as gas, which is up by 17%, electricity, which is up by 10%, and food, which is up by 3%, and it is still too expensive to fill up a car with fuel.
If the Government do not take action, what is the alternative? It is debt. Debt experts warn that many families are facing extreme difficulty in managing their finances, and that they have seen an increase in the number of people coming to citizens advice bureau on the subject of debt. As I have said before, the Government should help families immediately by taking measures that would address the cost of living crisis and stop rip-off prices for power and fuel.
Labour supports measures that would help families and offer practical, affordable ways to help people right now and get our economy moving again. The country needs a Government who are in touch with families during the recession, and the Government clearly need to make different choices and set different priorities. A start would be to stop handing over £40,000 tax cuts to millionaires and to stop the raid on families’ tax credits by reversing the pension tax break for those earning more than £150,000. They should help pensioners by forcing energy firms to cut gas and electricity bills for the 4 million over-75s, and they should use the money raised by a tax on bank bonuses to create real jobs with a living wage, which would provide young people with a decent standard of living.
This country needs a change in economic direction now if it is to raise the living standards of hard-working families. For many people in the UK, things have got worse, not better in the past three years. Last Wednesday, the Government set out their programme for the coming year and told us what we already knew: that they are a tired Government who have run out of ideas for working people, young people, families, pensioners and even the disabled—in fact, it would seem, for everyone except millionaires.