Income Tax (Charge)

Jim Shannon Excerpts

Tuesday 5th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Wes Streeting]

I am grateful for that intervention for two reasons. First, it gives me an opportunity to say to GPs, hospices and other parts of the health and care system that will be affected by employers’ national insurance contribution changes that I am well aware of the pressures, we have not made allocations for the year ahead, and I will take those representations seriously.

Secondly, it gives me a chance to ask the hon. Member and the Opposition: do they support the investment or not? Are they choosing to invest in the NHS or not? They are now confronted with the hard reality of opposition. Just as when we were in opposition we had to set out how much every single one of our policies would cost and how those would be funded, they have to do that now. If they oppose the investment, they have to tell us where they would make the cuts in the NHS. If they oppose the investment, they have to tell us where they would make the cuts in school budgets. Those are the choices that we have made, and we stand by those choices. The Opposition will have to set out their choices, too.

I was told that because the Conservatives had run up huge deficits in NHS finances, I would not be able to deliver the 40,000 extra appointments a week that we had promised. In fact, I was told that we would have to cut 20,000 appointments a week instead. The Chancellor and I were not prepared to see waiting lists rise further. She put the funding in, and an extra 40,000 patients will be treated by the NHS each week. That is the difference that a Labour Budget makes.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

It would be churlish of anybody in the House not to welcome the £22 billion that has been allocated to the NHS. Everyone across this great United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland will benefit from that.

A number of my GP surgeries have contacted me about their national insurance contributions, which they see as a catalyst to perhaps not being able to deliver what they want to do for their patients. I understand that the Labour party and Government are looking at that in a consensual way. Can the Secretary of State please give me the latest position so that I can go back to my GPs and tell them, “This has been looked at and there will be something coming”?

[Wes Streeting]

I am grateful for that intervention. It is of course for the devolved Administrations to decide how to use the Barnett consequentials that the generous uplift in funding provided by the Chancellor will provide. We make no bones about it: we had to make some difficult choices in the Budget to plug the £22 billion black hole that we inherited, to deliver on our promises and to ensure that we are fixing the foundations of our economy and our public services. We have asked businesses and some of the wealthiest to make a contribution. I say to people right across the House that they cannot welcome the investment at the same time as opposing the means to raise it. If they do, they have to explain how they would find the money.

--- Later in debate ---

[Darren Jones]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. These were promises made by the last Government that they knew they did not have the money to pay for. This was spending from the general reserve—the money put aside for genuine emergencies each year—that they blew three times over within the first three months of the financial year. Anyone who runs a business, anyone who runs family finances and anyone who is in charge of the country’s finances should know that that is shameful, and the Conservatives should apologise to the country for it. Nowhere is that more true than in our public services, which have suffered as a consequence of the Conservatives’ mismanagement. For example, Lord Darzi’s independent report into the state of our NHS found that the past 14 years had left the NHS in a critical condition.

[Jim Shannon]

We very much welcome what the Government are doing in relation to the contaminated blood and Post Office Horizon scandals, but let ask the Minister a very gentle question—a question that needs to be answered—in relation to the WASPI women? When the right hon. Gentleman was in opposition, we all supported the WASPI women, and now he is in government. I understand that the Government are looking at this issue. What will happen to the WASPI women? Can we expect to have that addressed during this term?

[Darren Jones]

As the hon. Gentleman knows, the ombudsman reported to this House before the election, making a number of recommendations, but did not conclude the basis on which a compensation scheme might apply. Further work is therefore required, which the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions is looking at, but I would point him to the fact that this is a Government who honour their promises. If we look at the infected blood scandal or the Post Office Horizon scandal—an issue that I worked on for many years—we were told by the Conservatives that they were doing the right thing by compensating the victims, but they did not put £1 aside to pay for it.

From education to our justice system, we have inherited public services that are on life support, but I do not need to tell working people that. Sadly, they know it all too well, because the last Government lost control of both our public finances and our public services. This Budget and this Government will get both back under control. I will now outline how we should do that, by focusing on one simple word: reform. Reform is urgent, because we cannot simply spend our way to better public services.

This is a Government for working people, and we are determined that they will get the best possible public services for the best possible price, but public service reform is not just about policy or IT systems or procurement, as important as they are; it is about people. It is about the people at the end of each of our decisions: the patient in the hands of the NHS with worry and hope in their heart; the pupil in a school, college or university with aspirations that should be met; and the pensioner who wants to feel safe walking to the shops on their high street. Behind each of those people is a doctor, a nurse, a teacher, a police officer or a civil servant.

These are public servants who have chosen to work in public service to serve the public, as this Government do. They are public servants and people who today feel frustrated by not being able to access public services and not being able to deliver them. These are public services that, when performing well, deliver a well-functioning state and help keep workers educated, well and able to help grow our economy and protect our country. It is for these people that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor confirmed we will deliver a new approach to public services that is responsible, that looks to the future and that balances investment to secure public services for the long term with reforms to drive up the quality of those services today, and with reform as a condition for investment. From the Attlee Government founding the NHS to the Blair Government reforming poorly performing state schools, reform is in Labour’s DNA.

I now turn to some of the points made by right hon. and hon. Members today, and I begin by congratulating my hon. Friends the Members for Broxtowe (Juliet Campbell), for Sunderland Central (Lewis Atkinson) and for Stourbridge (Cat Eccles), and the hon. Member for Yeovil (Adam Dance), on delivering their maiden speeches.

There were many speeches today, so colleagues will have to accept my apologies for not being able to address all 80 contributions individually. However, I join my Labour colleagues in celebrating this Budget, because building an NHS that is fit for the future is one of this Government’s five missions. That is why we have invested over £22 billion, the highest real-terms rate of growth since 2010 outside of the covid response.

I have also heard the voices of hon. Members from Northern Ireland and Scotland, including the hon. Member for Inverness, Skye and West Ross-shire (Mr MacDonald), who encouraged me so dearly to listen to his speech but has not returned to the House for my summing up. Under this Labour Government, the largest real-terms funding increase since devolution began has been delivered for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. This Labour Government are delivering from Westminster for the people of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, and we will work in partnership with the devolved Governments to deliver the change for which people voted, and which we have now given the devolved Governments the money to deliver.