Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Jeremy Hunt and Peter Grant

Tuesday 21st March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Hunt]

I thank my hon. Friend for the inimitable way in which he asked his question. I hope that he was reassured to some extent by the £9 billion cut in the planned level of corporation tax in the Budget, and, if we make the arrangement for capital allowances permanent, as I should like to, that will give us the best investment incentives anywhere in the OECD.

[Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)]

May I be the first to defend the Chancellor, and indeed the shadow Chancellor, against any accusation of socialism?

Can the Chancellor explain why the Cameronbridge distillery in my constituency, which is a major employer in an area of high unemployment, faces an increase of about £350 million in its excise tax bill this year? That is more than the additional amount that the Chancellor claims to be giving to the whole of Scotland. Will he explain why my constituents, and the companies that employ my constituents, are having to contribute additional taxes to pay for his economic failure?

[Jeremy Hunt]

Let me gently say to the hon. Member that the freeze in alcohol duty which we introduced in the autumn of 2021, and which will continue until August this year, has constituted a £2.7 billion tax cut over four years. We do everything we can to help the vital Scottish whisky industry.

Autumn Statement

Debate between Jeremy Hunt and Peter Grant

Thursday 17th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Hunt]

It was a tough choice to increase taxes by £25 billion, largely for the well-off, so that we could find more money for schools in the hon. Lady’s constituency.

[Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)]

Far the best way to take people out of poverty is to pay them a decent wage so that they never get into poverty. I see that the Chancellor is nodding. Why has the nodding Chancellor announced today that the minimum wage will fall behind the cost of living? The Tories’ pretendy-kiddy-on living wage is even more pretendy-kiddy-on than it was before—a real-terms pay cut for the 2 million lowest-paid earners in the United Kingdom. What assessment, if any, has the Chancellor made of how long he expects it to be before every single worker in the United Kingdom has a legally guaranteed right to that most basic of employment rights, a decent wage that is enough to live on?

[Jeremy Hunt]

We may have political disagreements on the Union, but I hope the hon. Gentleman will welcome the fact that we have made enormous progress with our national living wage. Today’s announcement means that for someone working full time it will go up by £1,600, which will help a great many of his constituents—and that is before all the other help that we are giving with heating costs—fuel costs—for people on means-tested benefits. So I think we are doing a lot, and we will continue to look at whether we can do more.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Jeremy Hunt and Peter Grant

Tuesday 15th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Hunt]

I can absolutely give the hon. Gentleman that undertaking. We must remember that, for those businesses, very often the most insidious taxes are those that they have to pay before making any kind of profit, because those are the taxes that can make them go under. As the Conservative party—the party of small business—we will think very hard about their needs.

[Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)]

Governments do not create wealth, says the Chancellor. Well, this Government certainly do not, nor did any of their predecessors.

Can the Chancellor tell us at what point in his predecessor’s so-called plan for growth did he realise that it was a recipe for economic disaster? If, like everyone on the Opposition Benches, he realised that before his predecessor had sat down, why did it take him so long to speak up about it?

[Jeremy Hunt]

I did actually reverse most of those measures within three days of becoming Chancellor, so, among my many failings, the one thing I cannot be accused of doing is being slow to change things.

Economic Update

Debate between Jeremy Hunt and Peter Grant

Monday 17th October 2022 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Hunt]

We are not going to do fracking unless it has local consent, but I also say, as someone who believes passionately that we have to do more on climate change, that it is not helping climate change to import hydrocarbons from other countries and say that as a result we are being very virtuous in reducing our own emissions. We need to do what it takes to reduce overall emissions.

[Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)]

Can I thank the Chancellor in advance for what he has promised to publish over the next two weeks because it will be the starkest ever confirmation of the awful price of Better Together?

Unless you are a banker on a bumper bonus, which not many of my constituents are, you are looking at higher food prices, higher fuel prices, higher mortgages, reducing wages in real terms, falling benefits in real terms and savage real-terms cuts in public services. Alternatively, my constituents could be building towards a Scotland that is creating 385,000 jobs in renewable energy, producing between three and four times as much energy as we need, and—who knows?—maybe even selling it on at mates’ rates to our friends and neighbours, as long as they treat us well. I respect the Chancellor’s right to dismiss that future. I think he is doing himself an injustice by basing his dismissal on blind, evidence-light dogma, rather than looking at the facts, but does he accept that it is not for him, anyone on the Government Benches or, indeed, anyone on the Opposition Benches to deny my constituents the right to choose between those two futures?