Autumn Statement Resolutions

James Murray Excerpts

Monday 21st November 2022 Commons Chamber

[James Murray (Ealing North) (Lab/Co-op)]

Today’s debate has confirmed what we all knew immediately after the autumn statement last week: the Conservatives have no plan to get us out of the mess that results from 12 years of their economic failure. The Prime Minister and Conservative MPs may try to pretend that the mess that we are in is entirely the result of global factors—no one denies the deep impact of covid and Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, which we are all united in condemning—but the problems we face have much deeper roots.

After 12 years of the Conservatives in Downing Street, the UK economy is growing at a third less than the OECD average and at a third less than during the Labour years. We are now the only G7 economy that is still smaller than before the pandemic. The one thing that the last Chancellor got right during his brief time in office was to confirm that our economy has become trapped in a vicious cycle of stagnation. Of course, he and his Prime Minister made a bad situation much worse by crashing the economy and forcing up people’s mortgage bills.

This crisis has not come about overnight, however; it has been 12 years in the making. Through their decisions in office, the Conservatives have left us uniquely exposed to the inflationary shock of oil and gas prices rising. They took misguided, short-sighted and damaging decisions to shut down our gas storage, stall on nuclear power and ban renewable technologies such as onshore wind. As a result, the UK is being hit with the highest inflation forecast in the G7 for this year and next year.

We know what a profound and shocking impact the current cost of living crisis and the Tories’ decisions over the last 12 years are having on many of our constituents, as we heard from many of my right hon. and hon. Friends today. My right hon. Friend the Member for East Ham (Sir Stephen Timms) spoke about the shocking impact of the number of people forced to rely on food banks in his constituency, and his neighbour, my hon. Friend the Member for West Ham (Ms Brown), spoke powerfully about her constituent Geetha, who is unable to cook food from the food bank as she is living in a hotel.

My hon. Friend the Member for Middlesbrough (Andy McDonald) spoke about the appalling housing conditions that some of his constituents have to face, and my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton North (Alex Cunningham) spoke about the lack of action on social care and health inequalities and its impact in his constituency. My hon. Friend the Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner) spoke of how food price inflation is causing misery to so many people, particularly after 12 years of Conservative government. My right hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne East (Mr Brown) spoke about the impact of the income tax personal allowance freeze on working people, and about how many students in his constituency are having to rely on food banks.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bristol South (Karin Smyth) spoke about social care and drew on her experience as a former co-chair of the APPG on apprenticeships to make some important points about apprenticeships. Her constituency neighbour, my hon. Friend the Member for Bristol East (Kerry McCarthy), spoke about the financial pressures their council faces in trying to protect vital services.

My hon. Friend the Member for Coventry South (Zarah Sultana) spoke about working people paying the price for the Conservatives’ economic failure while the Government insist on protecting non-dom tax status. Finally, my hon. Friend the Member for Swansea West (Geraint Davies) highlighted how we are the only G7 economy that is still smaller than before covid, and he spoke about the rising number of people using food banks in his constituency.

All the right hon. and hon. Members we have heard from today spoke about constituents across the country feeling the impact of this economic crisis on their household finances, and we know in this place that the Conservatives are offering no change. Real wages this year are lower than when the Tories came to power in 2010. This is the most profound period of wage stagnation in more than 150 years. Living standards will fall by 7% over the next two years, with real household disposable income per person set to be lower at the end of this Parliament than at the beginning.

Yet, despite the squeeze facing working people, the Conservatives chose in their autumn statement to raise stealth taxes on working people and to hike council tax. They chose to press ahead with tax rises that will cost an average earner more than £500 a year and will see the Government forcing a £100 tax rise on families in an average band D house. This will hit families and working people right across the country and, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Leicester South (Jonathan Ashworth) said, the income tax personal allowance freeze will see an extra 2 million pensioners being pulled into paying tax.

The Government have refused to follow our plans to make fairer choices. They refused to follow our plans such as those to raise billions by ending the large, untargeted tax breaks for oil and gas giants that are supposed to be paying a windfall tax. They could have stopped private equity fund managers who earn millions benefiting from a tax break on their bonuses. They could have closed the non-dom tax loophole to make sure people who make the UK their home pay tax on all their income here. Instead, the Conservatives’ choices will leave the British public, once again, paying the price for their economic failure.

As my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds West (Rachel Reeves)—I am honoured to be able to refer to her for the first time as my right hon. Friend—warned last week, the Conservatives are picking the pockets of working people across the country. When she responded to the autumn statement last week, she quoted a timely warning from the police about the behaviour of pickpockets:

“You may have an idea of what a pickpocket looks like but they’re far less likely to stand out in a crowd than you might think…they may work in teams to distract the target…One of their tactics is…where a thief will appear to be over-friendly…while pickpocketing you.”

I would add to that list a further warning from the police:

“Pickpocket teams are adept at creating distractions.”

That advice feels well worth bearing in mind when listening to this Government. The truth is that, no matter how many distractions the Conservatives try to wave up and down, their rhetoric will come to nothing when people feel the impact of the Chancellor’s new stealth taxes.

The average earner faces a tax rise of more than £500 a year from the Government’s income tax threshold freeze. When combined with double-digit inflation, this double whammy makes it clear that the British public are paying the price for the Conservatives’ economic failure.

Alongside their unfair choices, it is clear that the Conservatives have no plan for growth. They have no plan to get us out of the economic mess in which they have landed us. The Office for Budget Responsibility made that clear when publishing its view on the Government’s prospects for delivering growth, confirming that the UK economy will not return to its pre-pandemic level until the end of 2024. The OBR confirmed that the UK is forecast to have the lowest growth in the G7 over the next two years and that the measures in the autumn statement will make no difference to growth in the medium term. Yesterday, the CBI’s director general, Tony Danker, said of the autumn statement:

“There was really nothing there that tells us the economy is going to avoid another decade of low productivity and low growth.”

The British people cannot afford another decade like the last. We know that getting our economy growing as it could do is not something that will happen overnight, but we also know that we need a serious long-term plan to build a fairer, greener economy. We need to create good jobs in every part of the country by insulating our homes, ramping up homegrown renewables and investing in the zero-carbon technologies of the future. We need a modern industrial strategy, where the Government work hand in hand with businesses toward our common goals. We need to fix business rates, we need to fix the holes in the Government’s Brexit deal and we need to make sure that Britain is the best place in the world to start and grow business.

It is only by growing the economy that we will start to get out of the mess that the Tories have left us in. After 12 years, people are facing higher prices, higher mortgages and higher rents, and thanks to the autumn statement they are going to be facing even higher taxes, too. Only with Labour’s plan will we be able to start turning things around and finally delivering the higher growth that our country has been lacking for so long. Twelve years of economic failure is letting the British people down. The Conservatives failed to invest in what we need to protect our country and our economy from global shocks. They have failed our public services, they have failed to get wages rising and they have failed to set out a plan for growth. It is time for them to get out the way and let Britain succeed.