Oral Answers to Questions

John Healey Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd November 2026 Commons Chamber

[Clive Efford (Eltham and Chislehurst) (Lab)]

1. What discussions he has had with Cabinet colleagues on funding for the infected blood compensation scheme.

[The Chancellor of the Exchequer (John Healey)]

My thoughts today are with all those whose lives have been changed forever and the families who have lost loved ones through the contaminated blood scandal. I have very close friends who lost brothers and cousins nearly 40 years ago. Nothing can undo the suffering they have endured, and this Government are totally committed to recognising that profound hurt and injustice. Eligible claimants will receive the compensation they are due. We will continue working across Government to ensure that justice is delivered and compensation reaches the victims as quickly as possible.

[Clive Efford]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for that answer, and I am sure the whole House echoes his sentiments. There is concern among claimants, particularly those claiming for the estates of those who have passed on, because under Government regulations, the Infected Blood Compensation Authority is required to claw back overpayments. These are people who have been traumatised over many years, and those errors—Government errors, not errors on the part on the claimants—are causing distress and forcing people to relive their experiences. Can we ensure that Government and Treasury rules and regulations do not require IBCA to reclaim overpayments in this way?

[John Healey]

My hon. Friend has been a campaigner in this House for almost the whole time he and I have been here—we were elected together in 1997—and he raises an important point. If overpayments happen, it is the responsibility of the Infected Blood Compensation Authority to deal with them, and the IBCA appears to be reviewing a small number of cases. The Treasury has agreed that the authority can continue paying compensation under the scheme while it conducts those reviews. I have asked the authority to keep us updated on those reviews, and I will certainly do the same for my hon. Friend.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

Further to the question that the hon. Member for Eltham and Chislehurst (Clive Efford) has asked, some people and their families face delays in getting their money. For some families in Northern Ireland, the years catch up with them, their health catches up with them and they pass away, so I want to ensure that in the lifetime they have in this world—the short time that some of them have left—the moneys they are due actually get there. What has been done to ensure that those who are still waiting for compensation get it as a matter of urgency?

[John Healey]

The IBCA is following the inquiry’s recommendations about priority payments. It is prioritising claims from individuals who are sadly nearing the end of their lives, followed by those in older age groups. In the past two years, over £2.3 billion in compensation has been paid out to people who are either infected or affected, and I say to the hon. Gentleman—who has also been a long-term campaigner on this issue—that the Treasury is playing its part. We are making sure that those payments can be made through the annually managed expenditure, so there is no constraint on the payments that can be made under Treasury rules.

[Frank McNally (Coatbridge and Bellshill) (Lab)]

2. What discussions he has had with the Financial Conduct Authority on the impact of the withdrawal of the family protection plan by CMutual and Maiden Life Försäkrings on policyholders.

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[The Chancellor of the Exchequer (John Healey)]

My Budget last week took action to help people worried about the pressure of winter bills. A £100 household energy payment will be made directly to people’s bank accounts in 20 million households. We have the VAT cut from electricity bills, the 5p cut to fuel duty extended through the winter to July and standing charges removed entirely from gas bills next year. This action gives people a bit of breathing space with the cost of living pressures, and I am asking banks to pay a bit more to fund this help for households this winter.

[Claire Young]

The Treasury is cutting £1 billion from the warm homes fund, including a smaller than planned pot for the boiler upgrade scheme. Combined with tax rises on heat pumps, these cuts risk creating a boom-and-bust cycle for installers and leaving more households exposed to the volatility of the oil and gas market. Can the Chancellor explain how cutting support for clean heating is consistent with the Government’s own mission for a clean energy transition?

[John Healey]

Our priority is to give people who are facing a winter of worry with rising energy bills just a bit of relief. That is why the priority is the £100 paid directly into people’s bank accounts, which will go to 20 million households. That is four in five households in England, and it will reach nine out of 10 of the poorest third of families. It is timely, it is targeted and it is fair. It is a choice that this Government have made in the Labour Budget that I delivered last week.

[Mr Forster]

Yesterday, Trussell and the Joseph Rowntree Foundation wrote to the Prime Minister criticising the Government for freezing local housing allowance, saying that it will not help people with the cost of living and will critically undermine plans to end rough sleeping. Does the Chancellor agree with those national charities and Citizens Advice in my Woking constituency that rent support must be tied to actual rent levels?

[John Healey]

Rent allowance and how we best support the increase in the building of council and social housing were also part of my Budget announcements. They were not just about having a bit of breathing space and relief from the pressures that people immediately face, but action to start the long-term fix to our housing, including help for first-time buyers who do not have the backing of mum and dad and help to get council and social housing built in this country.

[Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)]

The measures in the Budget to help with the cost of living through cuts in energy bills were welcome. The Chancellor also said that he would adopt one of the Energy Security and Net Zero Committee’s recommendations not to add further policy costs to bills, but can I encourage him to look at one of our other recommendations, which is to move policy costs from electricity to gas? That would help people take up electric heat and batteries, which will enable them to take advantage of the tariffs that are available now.

[John Healey]

The action I took in the Budget last week was on top of help that the Government have given this year to help across the board with energy costs. It included some of the measures that my hon. Friend’s Committee has urged us to look at. Going into this Budget, I was conscious of the pressures and the worry that people have about rising energy bills, which are driven by the Iran war. My priority was therefore the steps we have taken: extending the 5p cut to fuel duty, extending the VAT cut on electricity bills, and removing the standing charge from gas bills for next year. Above all, we will see the direct payment of £100 into the bank accounts of 20 million households in January, which will help at that point of maximum pressure as people face those winter bills.

[Catherine West (Hornsey and Friern Barnet) (Lab)]

The Treasury Committee has done an enormous amount of work not only on the household bills situation, but also on the impact on graduates who still have significant debts. Can the Chancellor promise that when things do improve, he will look again at this burning issue for so many of our constituents?

[John Healey]

I will indeed. We will keep an eye on that, and no doubt we will return to it. However, I say to my hon. Friend, as I said to my hon. Friend the Member for Sefton Central (Bill Esterson), that the Budget provides for immediate action to help with the cost of living pressures and give people a bit of breathing space over the winter, but also for action to make deep reforms to our energy system that will bring prices down for business and for households in the long term. That means an end to the standing charges on gas bills, an end to Government policy costs simply loaded on to consumer bills through levies, and an end to buying and building new generation that does not bring cheaper as well as cleaner energy and cannot be connected to the grid. This is a Budget with immediate action to deal with the cost of living pressures, and action for the long-term changes that are necessary to bring British energy bills down in line with those in Europe.

[Esther McVey (Tatton) (Con)]

At the weekend the Chancellor said that the Budget would provide breathing space for families and working people, so will he tell the House today whether he agrees with his Minister, the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, who thinks that employers are not working people?

[John Healey]

Of course they are. That is why, in the Budget, I protected income that is earned. I protected income that is earned through dividends which are reinvested in business. I promised a “breathing space” Budget, and that is what I have delivered: help with the cost of living pressures and help with the cost of business pressures, with 70,000 high street businesses taken out of business rates altogether to lift our local areas, including the right hon. Lady’s constituency. Just as I am asking banks to assist with the cost of this help for households through the winter, I am asking gambling operators, big online sellers and vape shops to pay a bit more to help our high streets, and I hope the right hon. Lady will back that.

[Baggy Shanker (Derby South) (Lab/Co-op)]

With too many Derby residents dreading their bills as the nights draw in, I welcome the news that 93% of the households in our city will be given £100 of breathing space in their energy bills this winter, but whether it is the weekly shop or filling the car, budgets are being stretched from every direction. What other steps can the Chancellor take to give families who are struggling to make ends meet the extra breathing space that they need?

[John Healey]

My hon. Friend is right to highlight the 93% of families in Derby who will have this £100 payment paid directly into their accounts at the beginning of the winter. Let me also point out to him that the VAT cut on electricity bills from the first week of this Government is extended through the winter and the spring to July, just as the 5p cut in fuel duty is extended through the winter, through the spring and to July. We are also taking standing charges off gas bills next year to help relieve the pressure that people face and the worry over energy bills.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Minister.

[Mr Peter Bedford (Mid Leicestershire) (Con)]

The Office for Budget Responsibility said last week that higher taxes were weighing on living standards, with the tax burden heading for a record high. The Budget was a missed opportunity for the Chancellor to cut the cost of living by cutting taxes, but instead his answer was to cut the price of gherkins. The Chancellor promised “breathing space” nine times in his speech; does he really think that 6p a day in savings amounts to breathing space for hard-working families?

[John Healey]

There will be a council tax cut in the new year. A VAT cut in electricity bills will be extended. A 5p cut in fuel duty will be extended through next winter and into July.

This is also a Budget that has rejected broad-based tax rises. This is a Government and a Budget making sure that we close the loopholes and target the measures we are taking at those who can pay, and pay what they owe. All those policies in the Budget are fully funded, because underpinning all is the fiscal discipline that is needed to rebuild confidence in this country, and confidence in our ability to manage our finances that were so badly damaged by the Truss mini-Budget in 2022.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.

[Daisy Cooper (St Albans) (LD)]

The Government’s use of the outdated council tax system to roll out their energy support package has led to an absurd situation whereby between 800,000 and 1.4 million people on low incomes will miss out on the £100, while a wealthy couple who have retired early and have downsized are set to benefit. There is absolutely no excuse for this. The Government could have followed our plan to use existing DWP and HMRC data to roll out a targeted essential energy guarantee, getting the most help to those who need it most, so why on earth did they not do so?

[John Healey]

The hon. Lady disappoints me. Nine out of 10 of the poorest households will benefit from the £100 direct payment. Four out of five households in total—20 million—will benefit from this. She will have seen in the Budget that, for those who do struggle, I have also put an extra £100 million into the special fund that local authorities have to administer. They can make payments in hardship cases for those under extreme pressure, and I encourage her to point people to that.

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[Graeme Downie (Dunfermline and Dollar) (Lab)]

T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

[The Chancellor of the Exchequer (John Healey)]

Three weeks ago, I attended the International Monetary Fund annual meeting. The IMF said that Britain now “stands out” among G7 nations for our fiscal credibility. Last week, my Budget continued that progress. It was a Budget built on fiscal discipline—I meet our fiscal rules and bring borrowing down in every year of the forecast period—and it means that the UK is set to reduce the deficit by more than any other G7 country by 2029. This Budget was a clear political choice: to give Britain breathing space today and fresh hope for the future. As our new Treasury analysis shows, our overall winter support will benefit those with the lowest incomes most. This is how Britain will help British families in the midst of the Iran war—a war that the Conservative party wanted to jump straight into. This support is funded by a fair and time-limited tax on banks, which the Conservatives oppose. This is our choice. This is our Budget. This is a Budget for working people.

[Graeme Downie]

The Chancellor is very well aware of the threat to our economy of Russian cyber and physical attacks, but the UK public are not. My recent report, “The Putin Tax”, found that it was already costing the economy in excess of £2.5 billion a year and each taxpayer more than £100 a year. With families facing rising bills, I am sure that people would much rather spend that money themselves than give it to a dictator like Vladimir Putin. Will the Chancellor help to fulfil the Prime Minister’s recent commitment to me by gathering and publishing the data on the cost of Russian attacks so the public know how much Putin is costing their family?

[John Healey]

I thank my hon. Friend for his important work. We know that Putin’s aggression is imposing real costs both on Ukraine and here at home. That is why we provided an extra £10 billion of new economic and military support for Ukraine in the Budget, alongside new investment to bolster Britain’s cyber-defences. We will continue to stand up to Russian aggression and to strengthen Britain’s security in order to ensure that Putin does not succeed in undermining us here, in this country.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Chancellor.

[Andrew Griffith (Arundel and South Downs) (Con)]

Last week, the Chancellor had his chance to get debt under control. Instead, the Office for Budget Responsibility confirmed that it will rise—every single year. It is another missed opportunity. The national debt is now the equivalent of £100,000 for every household. It is why we recently had the highest borrowing costs for 30 years. As a result of the Chancellor’s policies, the Bank of England is expected to raise interest rates this week. Will he now admit that it is his failure to get a grip on borrowing that will be causing rates to rise?

[John Healey]

The Budget confirms that borrowing will fall every year during the next period. Debt will start falling from 2028-29. The hon. Gentleman is right that we inherited a debt mountain. We inherited that as part of the consequence of the disastrous mini-Budget that he was part of in the Treasury team. It crashed the economy and it collapsed confidence in Britain’s fiscal strength. We are fixing his failures. The chief investment strategist for L&G said this week that our Budget makes the UK

“the adult in the room when it comes to fiscal discipline.”

The Conservatives have learned nothing. Their latest policies represent over £30 billion in unfunded tax cuts, with the wealthiest benefiting most. With Labour, we have got support for families; under the Tories, it is a return to the—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. We are rerunning the Budget—other people need to get in. Come on, folks, let’s help each other.

[John Healey]

The Prime Minister has said that he is open to discussions about an apology for Britain’s role in the slave trade. He has also said that reparations are not the right approach. Considering a formal apology does not mean accepting that British people today should be held liable for the past, which they played no part in. The hon. Gentleman asks this question to distract from the Budget, but the questions that people are asking are these. Why does he not back the Budget action we have taken to give Britain a bit of breathing space? Why does he not back the action we are taking to fund that help this winter?

[Catherine Atkinson (Derby North) (Lab)]

T3. Before the Budget, I wrote to the Chancellor to flag that many of the challenges facing the Ministry of Justice were rooted in long-term financial pressures. Austerity saw justice spending cut by a third, and although the Government have increased funding, the Institute for Fiscal Studies says that an additional £3.6 billion would be needed if we were to return to pre-austerity spending per person. Will the Treasury work with the Justice Secretary to ensure that our justice system is properly funded and that future crises are prevented?

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[Daisy Cooper (St Albans) (LD)]

The Prime Minister and his Cabinet rightly point to Brexit as a major reason for the UK’s doom loop of low economic growth, and in two and a half weeks’ time, the Government will have an opportunity to do something about it. Rather than just discussing a timid UK-EU youth mobility scheme that should have been agreed months ago, will they start negotiations for a new growth and defence partnership as the only surefire way to put money back in people’s pockets and make the UK stronger, safer and more prosperous?

[John Healey]

We have “been there, done that” on defence. At the EU summit later this month, we are faced with the chance to add billions to our economy and help with prices, with a new deal on food, drinks and farming. It is a chance to reinforce the collaboration on illegal immigration that will help to tackle the small boat smuggling gangs, and it is a recognition that the Brexit deal done by the Conservatives has just not been good for Britain. The Conservative party is opposing all the steps we are taking to improve Britain’s business trading, while we look for practical benefits to make it better.

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[Imogen Walker (Hamilton and Clyde Valley) (Lab)]

T5. Real progress was made in the Budget on the former mineworkers’ pensions, and I am very grateful to the Chancellor and the rest of the team for that, but there is more to do and time is pressing. Our mineworkers did incredibly difficult jobs in very challenging environments and kept the lights on for all of us—they deserve every penny of their pensions. Can the Chancellor tell me when we can expect an update on the release of the remaining funds?

[John Healey]

I know my hon. Friend welcomes the step I took at the Budget that guarantees that every penny of the pension fund surplus will now go in full to miners. I know the job is not done; I will go on to ensure the full transfer of the guarantors fund. I want a way to resolve this in weeks, not months. That work is under way. It will be done jointly by the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero and the Treasury. I will ensure that my hon. Friend and other Members across this House from mining communities like mine are fully updated on that work.

[Douglas Lumsden (Aberdeen South) (Con)]

T7. The OBR’s “Economic and fiscal outlook” published alongside the Budget last week included forecasted revenues from Rosebank. Yet the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for Energy and Net Zero maintain that no decision has been taken on Rosebank. Will the Chancellor therefore acknowledge that if Rosebank is not approved, it will blow a huge hole in his Budget?

Financial Statement and Budget Report

John Healey Excerpts

Wednesday 28th October 2026 Commons Chamber

[The Chancellor of the Exchequer (John Healey)]

This is a Budget for the working people of Britain, for British businesses big and small, delivered at a time when global uncertainties and pressures are swirling worldwide and hitting people here at home. It is a Budget built on fiscal discipline, which matches immediate action today with clear direction for the future: first, by giving Britain some breathing space on the cost of living and the cost of business; secondly, by backing the enterprise of British business to unleash innovation and growth in every postcode; and thirdly, by tackling the big challenges on energy, national security, public service procurement and transformation, and housing.

In this Budget, I will set out the new approach that this Administration is taking—led by the vision of our new Prime Minister, demonstrated in our first 100 days and carried through today’s Budget, the 10-year plan for Britain and the spending review next year, to steer us through the global economic storms today, chart a new course for Britain in the years ahead, and give people fresh hope for Britain’s future.

It is an honour to stand here as Chancellor of the Exchequer to deliver my first Budget. I had hoped that I might be the most closely watched member of the Government this week until the Prime Minister went on “Gogglebox”.

At the outset of this Budget statement, I want to pay tribute to my predecessor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds West and Pudsey (Rachel Reeves)—Britain’s first ever female Chancellor after 800 years. She brought fiscal discipline to this country. She took—[Interruption.] She took the decisions required to boost investment, cut NHS waiting lists—

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

Order. Colleagues who are chuntering will need a lot of stamina as we have many hours to go. Let us keep the Chamber calm.

[John Healey]

My right hon. Friend took the decisions required to boost investment, to cut NHS waiting lists and to lift half a million children out of poverty. I also want to thank my outstanding team of Treasury Ministers and officials, and the Office for Budget Responsibility for producing today’s forecasts.

Analysts like to speak of economic headwinds, but what we face today are global economic storms, with trade tensions acting as a drag on global growth and Putin’s illegal invasion of Ukraine approaching now the end of its fifth year. The OBR sets out that the war in the middle east is a key driver affecting its forecasts today. The Government continue to work with our allies to end the conflict and restore shipping through the strait of Hormuz.

We did not want this war, and we rejected the calls from the Leader of the Opposition to jump two-footed into it. It is a war that has driven up costs on British families and on British businesses. Inflation, which was due to fall earlier this year to the 2% target, has now risen, driven by higher oil and gas prices. Oil is up from around $70 a barrel to well over $100 and gas prices have nearly tripled since February. For families, that means higher prices at the pump, higher energy bills and higher mortgages. For businesses, it means higher running costs and more expensive business loans.

The impact is felt in the public finances, too. Driven by the conflict in the middle east, Government borrowing costs across the G7 are reaching highs not seen for decades. In today’s forecast, the OBR predicts that we will spend £14 billion more on debt interest this year. Those are the storms we face. We cannot wish them away. We must choose the course we steer through them.

Fiscal discipline is my first commitment as Chancellor. More than ever, it underwrites every promise the Government make to the British people. In the Budget today, I meet the fiscal rules: the stability rule that day-to-day spending must be covered by tax receipts; and the investment rule that Government debt, defined as public sector net financial liabilities, must be falling as percentage of GDP. This year, for the first time, I must meet those rules in the third year of the forecast, and I do. My plans continue to reduce Government borrowing so that we spend less on debt interest and more on the priorities of the British people.

First, the stability rule. In the Budget today, I have chosen to use some of the headroom established last year to absorb the impact of the Iran war to protect the economy and to protect family budgets. My choices in the Budget mean that I have kept the Labour manifesto promise not to raise tax on working people—[Interruption.] I have rejected—[Interruption.]

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

Order. Mr Bowie, you are sitting far too close to me to be that noisy.

[John Healey]

I have also rejected broad-based tax rises or slashing public services, recognising that families and businesses need breathing space. The OBR confirms today that headroom against the stability rule will be £15 billion in 2029-30 before rising to £22 billion in 2030-31. That is what a buffer is for: use it when you need it; rebuild it when you can. Despite the global challenges, the Budget puts us on track to eliminate the current budget deficit and get Britain’s finances into the black within three years.

As a Labour Government, last year we cut borrowing to its lowest level in six years, from 5.1% to 4.4% of GDP. I continue that work today. In today’s forecast, borrowing falls to 4.2% this year, 3.4% next year, 2.9% in 2028-29, 2.1% in ’29-30 and 1.8% in ’30-31 and ’31-32. Our debt as a percentage of GDP is 83.2% this year, 83.8% next year and in ’28-29, before falling to 83.1% in ’29-30, 82.3% in ’30-31 and 81.7% in ’31-32.

It is because of our Labour decisions and it is because of our Labour plans that the International Monetary Fund has said that the UK now stands out as a country where

“action to reduce debt and deficit has been taken decisively”.

It projects our UK deficit will be the lowest in the G7 by 2029. The last time the IMF called the UK a standout was when Liz Truss crashed the economy. Her new book says she could have taken the British people to Mars. In reality, what she achieved in government, with help from the shadow Chancellor, was blowing a big black hole in the budget. That is the difference between Labour in government and a Conservative Government before us.

During this year of global economic shocks, forecasters predicted that the UK economy would slow down. Those predictions of gloom were about as accurate as the predictions of who would be the Chancellor. [Laughter.] Britain is defying expectations. In the first half of this year, our economy was the fastest growing in the G7, alongside the US. That is testament to the British people—the innovators, the business leaders and the workers on the frontline—and it is testament to the Labour decisions taken over the last two years. Government investment, up; business investment, up; productivity, up; and real wages, up. More since the election than in the first 10 years of the previous Conservative Governments.

I will never be complacent, but these are signs of resilience in the UK economy. Three months ago, the Bank of England upgraded its forecasts for UK growth this year, two weeks ago the IMF did the same, and today the OBR has upgraded its forecast to 1.2% this year, followed by 1% next year, 1.6% in 2028, 1.8% in 2029, 1.7% in 2030 and 1.6% in 2031. Yes, there are real challenges ahead, but Britain has beaten the forecasts this year, and with the action I am taking today, I believe Britain can beat the forecasts again.

Despite our economy’s resilience, I know that people are under pressure. Too many people feel this country is not working well for them. In particular, households and businesses face challenges from rising energy costs due directly to the conflict in the middle east. In the face of that, what matters is how we respond as a Government, and my choice in the Budget today is to give families and businesses some breathing space now and to begin the radical reform of energy to reduce bills in the future.

Last week, my right hon. Friend the Energy Secretary opposed—approved—[Laughter.]

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)]

Order. We have a long way to go. Dr Luke Evans, you will have to write yourself a prescription to calm down.

[John Healey]

At least they are still awake, Madam Deputy Speaker.

Last week, my right hon. Friend the Energy Secretary approved the Jackdaw gas field, boosting our energy security. This will protect hundreds of jobs and add an estimated £2.9 billion to the UK economy—a pragmatic, common-sense decision. Alongside that, I launched a new energy wealth fund for the UK. Today, I am setting a new course on energy to get UK energy costs down in line with Europe. From this point, our Labour Government priority is, first and foremost, cheaper energy, with clean power key to achieving it. This is possible because of the progress we have made towards clean power over the last two years, and this Government remain unshakeably committed to net zero by 2050. This will demand deep reform of our energy system, starting at the Budget today and carried through the 10-year plan into the months and years ahead.

For many years under Conservative Governments, policy costs were simply loaded on to household bills through levies. Today, I am putting an end to that. We will introduce a new cost control framework to drive down all aspects of energy bills, and I will scrap the upcoming gas shipper obligation—a levy to fund hydrogen projects—and instead back those projects directly from Government.

I am making further big changes to bring bills down in the long term. First, on clean power generation, this Government will only buy and build new projects when they lower bills and when they can connect to the grid. Secondly, we will further break the grip of international gas prices on our bills by moving more of our old renewables on to fixed-price contracts. Thirdly, we will build cheaper, faster grid connections through GB Grid, and reform the complex web of institutions that govern the system. This is how we deliver the radical change that Britain needs on energy. It will not happen overnight, so I am taking immediate action to give families and businesses breathing space in the here and now.

In the first week of this new Government, we took VAT off electricity for 29 million households. Today, I am extending that VAT cut through the winter and spring to July, taking £50 off the annual price cap. For business, our new British industrial competitiveness scheme will take 25% off electricity bills for 10,000 firms at the heart of British industry. It will go live in April, and I confirm that we will make backdated payments for energy costs this year too. Next year, working with my right hon. Friend the Energy Secretary, we will go further to make bills fairer. Gas standing charges cost people over £100 a year, regardless of how much gas they use, so from next year, through Ofgem, we will remove standing charges from household gas bills. We will set out similar reforms to follow for electricity bills.

Let me say this to families at home. I know that, with the conflict in the middle east, rising energy bills are a real worry. I know that people look to the Government at times like this, not to solve all their problems but to give them a bit of breathing space—so today, I am taking one further step. This winter, for 20 million households in council tax bands A to D, I am announcing a £100 energy payment for households. It will be paid directly into people’s bank accounts to deal with rising energy bills. That is a £2.6 billion scheme to take the pressure off in the coldest months and see people through to the spring. The Scottish, Welsh and Northern Ireland Governments will receive their share of this funding, and I call on them to do the same and give people in all nations of the UK breathing space on their energy bills this winter.

Madam Deputy Speaker, £50 off VAT, £100 off council tax. For this winter, two tax cuts; for next year, fairer bills; and for the long term, radical reform of the energy market to produce cheaper power. Breathing space now and hope for the future, delivered to the British people by this Labour Government.

For millions of people, the cost of living and the cost of doing business are the same—the home is the office, the van is the family car. Earlier this year, the Government extended the 5p cut to fuel duty and slashed red diesel to its lowest rate in over 20 years. With the war in the middle east still driving high fuel prices, I am extending these tax cuts for motorists through the winter and spring to July, supporting households, hauliers and farmers. For anyone who relies on their car for work, from care workers to engineers, I am increasing the higher mileage rate from 25p to 35p per mile, and I am making permanent the increase to the standard mileage rate introduced earlier this year.

In this Budget, I am acting on other costs, too. To help with the weekly shop, I am suspending tariffs on over 100 supermarket products to keep prices down. For pensioners, I am delivering the new pension tax allowance, so that pensioners with income of up to the value of the full new state pension will not pay income tax in this Parliament. For ex-mineworkers, I am guaranteeing that every penny of the pension fund surplus now goes to miners. I know the job is not done, and I will go on to ensure the full transfer of the guarantor’s fund. For carers, I am getting rid of the cliff edge on earnings, so that people do not lose their entire carer’s allowance when they earn a penny over the threshold. For 2.3 million of our lowest-paid workers, I am increasing both the national minimum wage and the national living wage by 3.9%.

I know that, for families, the worst thing is feeling that their kids are missing out—even on little things—because money is tight. So today I am announcing £15 million for organisations like Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library and BookTrust, which give books to children. I have heard calls for pay transparency on job adverts to close the gender pay gap, and we will act soon to make sure that women are paid and promoted fairly. This Labour Government are determined to make the economy work better for all families, so I have listened to representations from colleagues across the House about paternity leave, and I am making a down payment on change today. As a mark of respect for their role, I will make self-employed fathers and partners eligible for paid parental leave for the first time.

Since day one, I have said that I will be a Chancellor who champions the small British firms that give character to our communities: the bakeries, the cafés, the hair salons—they make the places we live and work the places we love. I want these businesses to invest, to recruit and to expand, so today I am taking action to support our high streets. In the first week of this Government, we cut 20% off business rates for pubs, clubs and music venues from April next year. I have heard calls from Members across this House and a call from one Member in particular—my right hon. Friend the Member for Makerfield (Andy Burnham)—so I am increasing the threshold for small business rate relief for retail, hospitality and leisure businesses from £12,000 to £18,000. That means for 70,000 more businesses, I am not just cutting their rates; I am taking them out of paying business rates altogether. That means half of our shops, restaurants and gyms will pay no business rates at all. For all other businesses in these sectors, I will freeze their rates in real terms so that none faces an above-inflation rise for the next two years.

To pay for this support for our high streets, I am raising taxes on gambling by increasing machine games duty from 20% to 25% for higher-stakes machines, while protecting pubs and seaside arcades. I will carve out adult gaming centres and vape shops from business rate reliefs and extend the business rates transitional relief supplement for another two years. I will also strengthen the requirements for online marketplaces so that sellers cannot avoid paying VAT when they sell online.

For those who feel like celebrating tax cuts for our high streets, I am providing a £10 million alcohol duty relief for around 2,000 small British brewers and British cider makers. Breathing space now, fresh hope for the future—delivered to the British people by this Labour Government.

I have made my commitment to fiscal control clear, and every policy in this Budget is fully funded. I have begun by making sure that people pay the tax they owe when they owe it and by closing loopholes in our tax system. First, I am giving His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs funding to improve compliance and stronger powers to collect overdue tax from those who can clearly afford to pay but ignore repeated contact. I am reforming the administration of self-assessed income tax from 2029, bringing more of these taxpayers in line with the majority, so that they make smaller, more regular payments instead of facing large bills that are often harder to pay.

Secondly, I am changing outdated rules so that people taking profits out of their companies are taxed consistently, and I will protect the treatment of genuine commercial transactions and families passing their businesses down to the next generation.

Thirdly, I am modernising the tax treatment of investment by foreign sovereigns. This will bring UK rules more in line with other investment and other nations, while remaining still one of the most generous regimes in the world.

Fourthly, I will resolve the question of VAT for larger taxi companies, ensuring they play by the same rules no matter where they are located, while still protecting smaller local firms.

Providing support for British families and businesses has meant raising some tax to meet my commitment to fiscal discipline. I have done this in a balanced way, protecting the incentives for business investment and the incentives and income from work. I am maintaining full expensing in corporation tax for eligible assets. For other assets, I will provide greater up-front relief for new investment, increasing the main rate first-year allowance from 40% to 50%, while reducing the main writing down allowance rate from 14% to 12%.

I am reducing the threshold for business asset disposal relief in capital gains tax from £1 million to £500,000, meaning no change for three in four claimants. I am increasing the rates of tax on income from property and savings by a further two percentage points from April 2027, with no change to tax on income from dividends and no change to tax on income from employment. Eighty-eight per cent of people will pay no more tax on their savings, and I am taking a new approach today to encourage people on ordinary incomes to save and to invest. I will not go ahead with the cut to the tax-free amount that people can put into a cash ISA. The limit will stay at £20,000 per year tax-free for people of all ages. To make investment more accessible, I will work with the sector to create a new “starter ISA” to reward first-time investors.

Finally, let me turn to banks. Our world-leading banks make a huge contribution to this country—in the tax they pay and in the jobs, industry and investment they support. As Chancellor, I want to say directly to our banks: I celebrate, and am grateful for, the role that you play. Amid the global economic storms, I am looking to our banks to help fund breathing space for British families, so banks will pay an extra 3% on the bank surcharge. This will be time limited to pay for immediate support on energy bills, starting in January and ending 15 months later.

I have made my choice at this Budget: asking a bit more of our banks to support ordinary people and raising taxes on gambling to support good growth on every high street. I challenge the Leader of the Opposition. Does she support today our support for British families and British firms, and does she back the action we are taking to pay for it?

The only way we keep Britain’s families and Britain’s finances secure for the long term is with an economy that is growing strongly. Our country is one of the most innovative in the world. We have top-ranking universities, vibrant start-ups and deep capital markets. Just today I can announce over £1 billion of new life sciences investment from Kindeva, Vertex and Convatec, backed by almost £70 million of Government funding, and supporting over 1,000 jobs. I can announce that Rolls-Royce will develop its next generation of turbine engine technology here in the UK, in partnership with this Government—a £2.5 billion investment supporting thousands of jobs across the midlands, Bristol and the UK. I want to build on our strengths to unleash the innovation power of Britain to drive competition and raise profits in British business—drawing a line on the costs holding business back with stronger public control, as I have done today on energy; proudly backing Britain’s entrepreneurs to succeed; and unlocking the potential of every part of this country with a new wave of devolution.

The biggest barrier to fast-growth firms here in Britain is investment here in Britain. In today’s Budget, I am boosting investment through our public financial institutions, with a further £20.4 billion for the National Wealth Fund and the British Business Bank over the coming years, supporting 140,000 jobs. I will work with pension providers, asset managers and the wider industry to accelerate more private investment into Britain’s innovative, fast-growth firms. We will prevent regulation from holding back investment by removing regulation and tariffs worth £800 million to business. We will legislate for a regulatory carve-out so that innovative products such as drones and medicines can be safely tested and rapidly scaled. I am re-establishing the Better Regulation Executive to cut outdated regulations and admin burdens on businesses and workers—scrapped by the Tories; re-established by this Labour Government.

I am determined that we use public procurement to back British businesses, buy British goods and promote British exports, so I am expanding challenge-led procurement, just as I did in Defence, so that the Government can be the first customer for innovative firms. I am developing a new definition of UK supplier, to identify companies that are creating genuine wealth, genuine investment and jobs here in Britain. [Interruption.]

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)]

Order. Mr Cartlidge, I think you have spoken more words than the Chancellor during this statement—[Hon. Members: “More!”] Ms Atkins, do not lead that with a “More”. I call the Chancellor.

[John Healey]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.

Nowhere is the necessary role for the state clearer than in artificial intelligence, and we must forge a British way to seize opportunities and guard against risks that is based on security. We are already world leaders in AI safety and security, which today’s Budget backs with an extra half a billion pounds. It is based on sovereignty, with our first-of-its-kind sovereign AI unit protecting UK interests by channelling Government investment into strategic British AI firms, backed today with another £140 million.

To ensure that our most sensitive data stays under British control, I am setting out a new deal for data centres in the UK. When the NHS uses AI to treat patients, we want that data here. When our armed forces use AI to keep us safe, we want that data here. So here’s the deal: I am today launching a new British data centre covenant with strict tests that data centres must meet to invest in local communities, create local jobs and protect local water supplies. In return, critical data centres will get the grid connections they need, and where necessary be allowed to build onsite generation while they wait. Built on sovereignty and security, I want to ensure that the British people can benefit from the huge potential upsides of AI, with a new AI challenge prize to find innovative uses for AI in public services, and the union learning fund to back workers. That is how Britain leads on AI: secure, safe and working for the British people.

Let me turn to enterprise. Britain does not lack great entrepreneurs, but too often we invent the technologies that the world wants here in the UK, then see the jobs and profits go somewhere else. High-growth firms make up less than 1% of small and medium-sized businesses, and they generate more than half the output. From the start-ups of today to the scale-ups of tomorrow and the billion-pound companies of the 2030s, I want to see them succeed and stay in Britain. So for those just starting out, I am tripling the trading allowance—the amount someone can earn from a new venture tax-free—from £1,000 to £3,000. I am launching a new young entrepreneurs allowance, which will cover a year of living costs for young founders while they turn their ideas into businesses. As recommended by the women in tech taskforce, I am also announcing a new scale-up programme to support female founders, and the British Business Bank will double its commitments to women-led businesses and funds to £200 million.

We need to get the best talent into our fast-growth firms, so I am reforming skilled worker visas and non-compete clauses in contracts, so that people who help build one successful company can move easily on to the next. Building on our world-leading enterprise management incentives scheme, today I am launching EMI2, doubling the generosity of the company share option plan so that more companies can hire and retain top talent as they grow.

Let me say this to the men and women building their businesses in Britain: I know that starting a company means taking a risk, often leaving a secure job to build something when there is no guarantee that it will work. I believe that when business founders take that risk, build an exceptional company and create wealth for Britain, we should recognise that success and keep those people here to invest again. That is why today I am announcing founders’ relief, a brand new relief in capital gains tax, with a 10% rate on lifetime gains up to £10 million for the founders of our most successful firms. That is how we make Britain the place where the companies of the future are built: entrepreneurs backed by this Budget, investment backed by this Budget, talent backed by this Budget, innovation backed by this Budget, growth backed by this Budget, and delivered to the British people by this Labour Government.

When I talk about unleashing Britain’s innovation power, I mean in every part of Britain. That is why we reformed the Treasury’s investment manual, the Green Book, so that we can invest in the potential of every town and city. That is what I do today in the west midlands with £10 million for a new market hall in Stafford; in the south-west with £10 million for Bristol’s Temple quarter and £3 million to help Plymouth’s young people get jobs in defence; in the east of England with new access to Government borrowing for the Greater Cambridge Development Corporation; and in the north with £15 million to upgrade the Leeds College of Building, £10 million for Bury’s indoor market, £20 million to restore Liverpool’s Littlewoods building and £3 million for a tech company incubator in the Don valley. I can announce that we will hold the next international investment summit in Gateshead in the spring.

The devolved Governments will receive equivalent funding for the measures in this Budget, and today I am also investing directly in high-growth industries in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. In Wales, there is £2.5 million for a science park in north Wales, £11 million for the Aberavon bridge and £30 million for Cardiff Parkway station; in Scotland, there is £18 million for advanced chip design led by Edinburgh University and £6 million for Glasgow’s Scottish event campus; and in Northern Ireland, there is £7.5 million for AI and cyber in Belfast. [Interruption.]

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

Order. I am sorry to interrupt the Chancellor again, but Mr Holmes, just like last year, your voice is carrying far too heavily across the Chamber, and the hon. Member for Bridlington and The Wolds (Charlie Dewhirst) promised me and his young daughter this morning, on the way to work, that he would behave—he has let himself down and his daughter down. [Interruption.] Order. I call the Chancellor.

[John Healey]

All power to your elbow, Madam Deputy Speaker.

London is the UK’s economic powerhouse, but if our other great cities matched their counterparts in France and Germany, growth in this country would be transformed. Local leaders should not have to come cap in hand to Whitehall to build a new tram or a new concert hall, and when those projects lead to growing local companies and rising local incomes, it should be those same areas that keep the proceeds.

This radical rewiring of the state is a dual mission, led by the Treasury and No. 10 North. In today’s Budget, I am announcing new good growth funds for mayors and incubator capital for areas without mayors. I am announcing flexible funding to invest in local economies, boosted by a further £1.5 billion of devolved loans for mayoral authorities—funds that will back projects such as the new Black Country metro extension, led by the Mayor of the West Midlands; the urban regeneration in Gateshead Quayside, led by the Mayor of the North East; and, in my home region, the reopening of Doncaster airport, led by the Mayor of South Yorkshire.

This is unfinished business for me. As a Treasury Minister in the last Labour Government, I was proud to help create the regional development agencies. They delivered economic growth and local regeneration, before they were axed in 2010 by the Tory-Lib Dem coalition Government. But there is a further step that we never took—the most radical act of devolution in a generation: the devolution of tax revenues. That is the step I take today, alongside this Budget—a road map for fiscal devolution.

For the first time, I am making the commitment that 100% of business rates will be retained locally by the end of the decade, so if local leaders help businesses to start and grow, more of the rates they pay will stay in that area. From next year, 20% of business rates revenues will go to mayors, and from 2028, a share of income tax receipts will go to mayors as well.

Also from 2028, mayors and other strategic authorities will have new powers to introduce an overnight visitor levy. Taken together, these are long-term funding streams that they can use to back investment into big local infrastructure, so that more of the money that is raised locally can be invested and spent locally, on projects like the Trent sports district, led by the Mayor of the East Midlands, and the Bakerloo line extension, led by the Mayor of London. These are new powers for the people who know their areas best—not sentimentality, but supply side economics. It is the biggest wave of devolution in a generation, driving good growth in every postcode, delivered to the British people by this Labour Government.

I decided on an early Budget to give the country a bit of breathing space, and to provide stability and direction in the face of speculation. We will continue to map out that direction for Britain through the Prime Minister’s 10-year plan and the spending review.

The Labour party is the party of public services. Since 2024, we have rejected austerity, we have been rebuilding our public services with over £40 billion a year of extra day-to-day spending, and we are making our streets and borders safer, fixing crumbling classrooms, extending childcare and restoring our NHS, spending £37 billion more on health this year than in the last year of the last Conservative Government. Today I am accelerating our work to halve violence against women and girls, and setting up a new misogyny prevention fund, partnering with the private sector.

I want to pay tribute to my Cabinet colleagues and thank them for everything they are doing, prioritising within their Department budgets in the face of tough fiscal constraints. In today’s Budget, I am fully funding the defence investment plan, including through capital reprioritisation across Whitehall. This honours the commitment made both by me and by the Prime Minister.

As we look ahead to the spending review, we start from a position of strength, with spending at that higher base. There will be choices we have to make about priorities, as we have shown we can, and efficiencies we must deliver, as we have shown we can. Last year, Departments hit double their productivity and efficiency target, generating £16 billion of savings. Asylum costs, which tripled under the last Conservative Government, have been cut by £1 billion under this Labour Government.

Strong public services and strong fiscal discipline are two pillars of our Labour approach, but delivering the next spending review will also require a fundamental rewiring of the state. First, a digital overhaul of Government. In the Budget today, I am investing in AI for the civil service transformation, to support saving a further £600 million from back-office costs. Alongside my right hon. Friend the Health Secretary, I am launching a review of NHS productivity and AI, so staff can spend their time with patients and not on admin.

Secondly, streamlining the state through devolution, reducing the double running between central and local Government. Today’s Budget provides £100 million for a local apprenticeship service to match young people with local firms, funded from savings in welfare fraud and error.

Thirdly, a new focus on prevention. Just as we ringfence capital spending to invest in future success, so at the next spending review I will ringfence prevention spending that brings down costs in the future, with new preventative departmental expenditure limits.

When it comes to welfare, the last Conservative Government left a broken system—a broken system that we are changing. Bringing back face-to-face assessments, rebalancing universal credit so it does not force people to label themselves as too sick to work, reforming Motability and clamping down on those living abroad from accessing a UK state pension on the cheap, but there is more to do. I refuse to write off a million young people, like the last Conservative Government. I refuse to see disabled people suffer the indignities of a system that has been found “not fit for purpose”, and I refuse to allow the burden of paying for this failing system to fall on taxpayers for decades to come. As the Prime Minister and I have both said, we will bring down the welfare bill, and we will do it in a Labour way.

Alan Milburn and the Timms panel will publish their final reports next month. This Government will then set out our response before the end of the year, with a White Paper and legislation to follow next year. The Prime Minister has already announced that from 2030 we will adjust the triple lock, so that the state pension rises every year and keeps pace with earnings and inflation. This will save £15 billion a year by the end of the 2030s—£50 billion by 2050. A new settlement for older generations: a rising state pension and a national care service that is there when older people need it, taking the burden off families and taking the burden off our NHS. Taken together, these reforms reject crude cuts that intensify cost of living pressures and drive up costs elsewhere in the system. Taken together, these reforms will rebuild our welfare system so that it supports people from youth into old age. This is our Labour approach—tackling long-term challenges, improving public services and restoring hope for the future.

Let me now come to two more long-term challenges, First, defence. The week in Kyiv started with Russia launching another brutal ballistic missile attack on the city. This morning, the Prime Minister and I called President Zelensky to tell him about our commitments in the Budget. He told us, “You have made my day.” There will be £10 billion of additional economic and military support, based on loans, export finance guarantees and half a billion in urgent military funding for this winter. The whole House—the whole country—is united for Ukraine. Today, we send a clear message to Moscow: Britain will stand with Ukraine for as long as it takes.

In this new era of threat, the demands on our UK defence are rising. Keeping the people safe by equipping our armed forces is the first duty of any Government. I say this as Chancellor; as a former Defence Secretary; and as a dad whose son is an Army reservist—a reservist who came back four years ago from early training to say that they had no kit and no bullets to fire. That is the truth. For 14 years, Conservative Governments hollowed out and underfunded our armed forces. I am proud to be part of a Labour Government who have made the biggest increase in defence spending since the end of the cold war.

This year, our defence budget is £14 billion higher than it was in the Conservatives’ last year of government. At the spending review next year, I confirm that I will set out the details of how we will meet our NATO commitment to spend 3.5% of GDP on defence by 2035, with a target date for 3% in 2030. Today, I am getting work under way to get there in a fiscally sustainable way. That will include looking hard at public spending, as I have done today to fund the defence investment plan, but I am also determined to use more innovative financing, alongside the private sector and our international allies.

First, I am launching today the new innovative defence finance taskforce to lead this work ahead of the spending review. Secondly, I am now confirming that we will commence treaty negotiations on the multilateral defence mechanism—or bank—with Finland, Poland, and the Netherlands to boost defence investment and joint procurement across NATO allies. Thirdly, we will expand our defence industrial base by getting the maximum amount of private investment into defence, including through public-private partnerships. Fourthly, as an immediate step, I can tell the House that the national wealth fund and the British Business Bank will launch a new focus on defence, dual-use technology and sovereign capability, deploying up to £5 billion of investment and lending over the next four years.

I will ensure this record defence investment works twice: once for our national security, and once for British jobs and British business. Places across all four nations—Barrow, Rosyth, Aldershot, Plymouth, Glascoed and Belfast—reindustrialised and transformed. Security for our nation, jobs for our people, fresh hope for the future—delivered for Britain by this Labour Government.

Let me now turn to housing. On Monday, the Prime Minister and I met Les at the Connection project at St Martin-in-the-Fields, just a stone’s throw from this Chamber. He had spent three months sleeping on the streets; now, he has a room, medical help and a bit of hope for the future. Les told me:

“Now I have the chance, I want to make something of my life.”

Anne, the nurse at the project, put it this way. She said that they

“put the team around the person”.

That is what we will do as a nation.

The Conservatives did promise to end rough sleeping, yet when they left office it had doubled. Ten years ago, as shadow Housing Secretary, I argued that rough sleeping was a shame on the nation. I said it could be solved, but only with national will. Government can fix this, if they choose, and this Government have chosen. We have already promised everyone sleeping rough a route off the streets this winter, and today, I confirm a further £430 million to keep that offer open for the rest of this Parliament—not just this winter, but every winter. This is a moral mission for me, a moral mission for the Prime Minister and a moral mission for the Labour party.

Home is the heart of all our lives. It is the foundation on which we raise our families and build our hopes. Rough sleeping is the sharp end—a symptom of a system that feels broken to too many people. Since the 1980s, Britain has lost over 2 million council homes. Tonight, more than 170,000 children will sleep in temporary accommodation. Two in five young people are trapped, paying more than a third of their income in rent while they watch their hopes of buying their own home slip away. I am taking action today to deal with immediate pressures and taking decisions to start to deal with the long-term challenges.

To get more homes built, I am drawing the line on constant changes to building regulations. There will be no major changes to building regulations in this Parliament, except where critical for safety, and I am removing biodiversity requirements for more brownfield sites. To get more council homes built, I am extending cheaper borrowing for councils and making all land sold to social housing providers VAT-free. Today, I am providing an additional £1.5 billion for the social and affordable housing programme, taking our total Government commitment backing council housing to £40 billion. The Conservatives sold off our council houses; Labour is now building them back.

Finally, for every young person who is working hard, saving what they can and dreaming of their first home, I am taking action. I am announcing that a first-time buyer ISA will replace the lifetime ISA. From today, I am dealing with the LISA penalty, so that if the home you want costs more than the limit, you will get back at least what you put in. And I am going further. From next spring, we have a new scheme for first-time buyers who do not have the bank of mum and dad behind them: Your First Home—an equity loan scheme, which I am funding today with £4.7 billion of Government-backed lending. Hope starts with a home. A route off the streets, a secure home to raise your kids, the keys to your own front door—delivered to the British people by this Labour Government.

This is a Labour Budget for the worker, the sole trader, the parent at the school gate, and the young person desperate to start their first job or start their first business. These are my choices: raising revenue from those who can afford to pay; no tax rises on wages or dividends; and cutting taxes for millions of families and businesses. Just as the British people helped to support our banks 20 years ago, it is our banks that will help to give families breathing space today. For our high streets, it is gaming machines and vape shops that will help to provide the funding for our pubs, shops and cafés to thrive—breathing space now, while taking the long-term action to get costs down for good.

The decisions I have taken today will help to steer Britain through. When the storms pass, what matters is where Britain is heading—a Britain reindustrialised; a Britain with power returned to communities, threats deterred and global opportunities seized. In our first 100 days, this Labour Government have set a course for fresh hope, good growth and support for those who need it. We know who we are, and we know where we are going. [Interruption.]

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)]

Order. Mr Bhatti, there is no need for that.

[John Healey]

We know who we are, and we know where we are going. We can see the Britain we want to be. It is a vision burned into every line of this Budget statement—breathing space now, fresh hope for the future, delivered to the British people by this Labour Government. I commend this statement to the House.

Provisional Collection of Taxes

Motion made, and Question put forthwith (Standing Order No. 51(2)),

That, pursuant to section 5 of the Provisional Collection of Taxes Act 1968, provisional statutory effect shall be given to the following motions:—

(a) Stamp duty land tax (local government pension scheme pools) (motion no. 49);

(b) Stamp duty land tax (withdrawal of group relief) (motion no. 51);

(c) Value added tax (electric vehicle charging) (motion no. 55).—(John Healey.)

Question agreed to.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)]

We now come to the motion entitled “Income Tax (Charge)”. It is on this motion that the debate will take place today and on succeeding days. The questions on this motion and on the remaining motions will be put at the end of the Budget debate on Tuesday 3 November. I call the Chancellor to move the motion formally.

Cost of Living

John Healey Excerpts

Tuesday 27th October 2026 Written Statements

[The Chancellor of the Exchequer (John Healey)]

Millions of families and working people across the country will benefit from five everyday fixes, which will support people who rely on their cars for work, extend help to new parents and fix an unfair cliff edge that can penalise unpaid carers for earning more. These changes will help with the cost of food, fuel and family life, providing breathing space for households. The Government are announcing changes to:

Go further to support employees and self-employed people who use their own vehicle for work by increasing tax free mileage rates. Approved mileage allowance payments allow employers to reimburse employees tax-free for business mileage in their own private vehicles, and the same rates are used by self-employed drivers to claim tax relief through simplified motoring expenses and payments made within the approved rates can be disregarded for class 1 national insurance purposes. In May the Government increased the tax-free mileage rate for the first 10,000 business miles for the first time in 15 years, from 45p to 55p per mile for 2026-27. The Government are today announcing that we will make that increase permanent and, to support those who drive the furthest for work, we are also increasing the rate above 10,000 miles from 25p to 35p per mile. Around 3 million people are expected to benefit, with someone driving 6,000 business miles receiving up to £120 a year in additional tax savings, and someone driving 15,000 business miles receiving up to £300 in additional tax savings.

Extend parental pay to eligible self-employed fathers, partners and adopters in Great Britain from April 2029. Those who are recently employed or unemployed, or with a broken or irregular pattern of employment will also benefit, provided that they have sufficient work and earnings history. This new parental allowance is expected to benefit over 150,000 parents each year. Detailed eligibility criteria will be confirmed in due course.

End the cliff edge within carer’s allowance, which sees carers lose £86.45 per week for a 1p increase in earnings above the weekly limit. Instead, earnings above the weekly earnings limit will be subject to a 100% taper, where support is reduced by only £1 for each £1 increase in earnings. This means carers are no longer left financially worse off for working additional hours or receiving a pay rise. The taper will begin within 2030-31 once the Department for Work and Pensions has developed a new IT system to implement the taper.

Suspend import tariffs on over 100 food products, fertilisers and kerosene heating oil to help reduce costs for households and businesses. Lower tariffs on food products are expected to deliver consumer savings worth around £120 million to £185 million per year. The Government are also extending existing business suspensions that are due to expire in 2026 and 2027, enabling domestic businesses across many sectors to continue to benefit from lower import costs. A new application window will be open from 11 November to 3 February, giving businesses the opportunity to submit views on further extensions and apply for new tariff suspensions.

Roll out hundreds more post office drop boxes, bringing the total to 1,000, making it easier and more convenient for people to send and return parcels without having to queue at a post office counter, helping to take some of the hassle out of everyday errands in the run-up to Christmas. This comes alongside upgrades to 600 post office branches by the end of the financial year, improving services for customers across the country.

[HCWS421]

AI: Economic Opportunities and Security

John Healey Excerpts

Monday 26th October 2026 Written Statements

[The Chancellor of the Exchequer (John Healey)]

Artificial intelligence is an age-defining technological change. The Government will ensure that AI is a force for good, strengthening the UK’s security and resilience and protecting it against emerging threats. This will ensure that the UK can shape the change that AI will bring, seize the opportunities it presents, and not be left vulnerable or dependent on other countries.

The economic opportunities from AI will only be realised if our critical infrastructure, public services and businesses are resilient to emerging threats. The Government will invest £165 million in a new national AI biosecurity initiative, including £100 million for an AI biosecurity lab and £65 million to strengthen bio-surveillance and develop medical countermeasures.

We will provide an additional £120 million for the AI Security Institute to strengthen its testing and research and develop technical standards to help mitigate AI risks. We will also invest £60 million in a national cyber-shield, including a £25 million challenge fund for UK AI and cyber-security innovators, and establish a £70 million national exposure and real-time vulnerability centre to identify cyber-vulnerabilities across our critical infrastructure and economy. A further £24 million investment will support the systematic hardening of the public sector technology estate.

Alongside protecting against emerging risks, the Government will strengthen the capabilities needed to ensure that Britain can shape its own economic future. We will provide an additional £60 million for the sovereign AI fund to invest in promising UK AI companies, including a new focus on physical and industrial AI; a further £60 million for the sovereign AI R&D procurement scheme; and £18 million for a new UK advanced chip design academy to strengthen advanced chip design capability.

Every part of the country must be able to benefit from AI. We will start by piloting local AI partnerships with mayoral strategic authorities, bringing together local leaders, businesses and education providers to pursue locally-led approaches to AI adoption. We will provide £15 million for an AI challenge prize to incentivise innovators to develop AI solutions to frontline public service challenges, with a first year’s focus on health, and £10 million per year for the AI Economics Institute to lead the UK’s work in understanding the evidence on AI’s impact on productivity, growth, jobs and living standards. The Government will also establish a new AI cyber-security centre of excellence in Manchester to train the next generation of cyber and AI experts.

Together, these measures will strengthen Britain’s security and resilience, build domestic capability and help ensure that people across the country benefit from AI.

[HCWS412]

Olympics and Paralympics: North of England Proposal

John Healey Excerpts

Monday 26th October 2026 Written Statements

[The Chancellor of the Exchequer (John Healey)]

The Government have today announced £7 million of funding for UK Sport to carry out a detailed feasibility study for a future bid to host an Olympic and Paralympic games in the north of England in the 2040s.

Major sporting events can bring significant economic, social and cultural benefits to the places that host them, and mayors and local leaders across the north have expressed strong support for bringing the games to the region. Hosting the Olympic and Paralympic games in the UK could also bring communities together for a shared national moment and create a lasting legacy for people across the country.

UK Sport has completed initial work to map the infrastructure requirements, costs and potential benefits of a northern games. That work indicates that the proposal merits further examination before any decision is taken on a bid.

This funding will allow UK Sport to lead the study, working with the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, northern mayors, council leaders, the British Olympic Association and the British Paralympic Association, the latter two of which would ultimately lead any such bid, to assess whether a games in the north would be deliverable, affordable and capable of delivering lasting benefits for the communities involved.

UK Sport will be expected to present findings to the Government in 2029. The Government will consider the assessment’s findings carefully and will update the House in due course.

[HCWS413]

Oral Answers to Questions

John Healey Excerpts

Tuesday 8th September 2026 Commons Chamber

[Tristan Osborne (Chatham and Aylesford) (Lab)]

15. What steps he is taking to help ensure that the UK remains the fastest growing economy in the G7.

[The Chancellor of the Exchequer (John Healey)]

May I start by paying tribute to my predecessor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds West and Pudsey (Rachel Reeves)? I am proud to have been a member of a Government with the first female Chancellor in 700 years. She did hard yards on the task of rebuilding Britain’s fiscal credibility, public services and levels of growth after 14 years of Conservative Governments’ failure. I now build on her work.

Yesterday, I set out the Government’s determination to see the next chapter of Britain’s growth story written in more places. That means more devolution and the combined force of the Government to get things done, back businesses and get more investment, innovation and jobs across the UK.

[Elaine Stewart]

Last week, the UK Government announced a financial boost of £11.8 million to support the regional economy across Ayrshire. The money will fund projects across Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock, supporting employability and business start-ups. Does my right hon. Friend agree that although the SNP is obsessed with centralising in Holyrood and taking away local powers, the route to regional economic growth lies in empowering local communities and local councils?

[John Healey]

My hon. Friend does a great job of standing up for the people of Ayrshire. The £11.8 million will fund jobs, training and business start-ups right across Ayrshire. In England, this is a Government who are backing local areas to generate growth in more areas, and I would love to see the Scottish nationalist Government do the same.

[Tristan Osborne]

Thank you, Mr Speaker—and happy Star Trek Day.

Last week, the Opposition chose to Klingon to the Truss legacy, and what a damaging legacy that was. How can we engage in warp speed, so that our economy continues to grow the fastest in the G7?

[Mr Speaker]

Captain Kirk!

[John Healey]

Mr Spock, I think some would say, Mr Speaker! My hon. Friend is right. Despite global conflicts, trade tensions and rising threats in the world, which are pushing up inflation, bearing down on growth and pushing up borrowing costs, the UK economy is demonstrating huge resilience. He is right that in the first six months of this year, the UK economy grew the fastest in the G7. I set out yesterday some early steps to back stronger growth in more places: backing innovation with more investment in fast-growth firms across the north; changing the Government’s Green Book discount rate so that projects across the country with long-term potential will get a fairer hearing; and taking an axe to the thicket of administration that too often slows down decisions, holds back growth and prevents the private investment that we need.

[Alan Mak (Havant) (Con)]

This week, Arthur Laffer, economic adviser to three former US Presidents, said Britain is being taxed to death under this Labour Government, so will the Chancellor rule out tax rises in the Budget?

[John Healey]

The hon. Gentleman could have asked that question to any Chancellor at any time in the past few decades, and no Chancellor ahead of a Budget would have commented on speculation or ruled out measures. I will set out the decisions I take before the House on 28 October, and I look forward to him being there on that day.

[Sarah Olney (Richmond Park) (LD)]

The former Chancellor invested a significant amount of political capital into driving forward the white elephant project of building a third runway at Heathrow on the basis that it would deliver economic growth, but the Government’s appraisal report states that the net present value of expansion is between minus £23.4 billion and minus £62.5 billion. Will this Chancellor put an end to this absurd proposal?

[John Healey]

After years of delay, indecision and often vexatious challenge, we have given the go-ahead to this project quite simply because the economic case stacks up and will help to bring growth.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Chair of the Treasury Committee.

[Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

I welcome the Chancellor’s clampdown on speculation and leaks ahead of the Budget; it is certainly an important step he has taken. On the issue of certainty, the National Wealth Fund is a critical investor in crowding in private investment around the UK. I noted that he has changed the remit. How will he balance his desire to see change with ensuring that it is strong and stable and that there is certainty for businesses seeking to invest with the support of the National Wealth Fund?

[John Healey]

I thank my hon. Friend for that, for the work she does in chairing the Treasury Committee and for her previous work on the Public Accounts Committee. She is right about the damage of speculation ahead of Budget. It led last year, for instance, to a large number of people cashing in pension pots, but the speculation was entirely unfounded.

On my hon. Friend’s question about the National Wealth Fund, we have capitalised it by over £200 billion, and the challenge is to ensure that we get good value-for-money decisions, but decisions made quicker, so that we can get investment into local areas to see private investment bring the growth that we need.

[Robert Jenrick (Newark) (Reform)]

I welcome the right hon. Gentleman to his position. I have known him for a long time—I wish him well. He has a huge task ahead of him. Earlier in the summer, the Prime Minister said that walking the streets of Makerfield lodged in his mind that so many working people want to see the personal allowance raised. In Reform, we want to do that as well; in fact, we want to raise it to £15,000 a year and to make work pay. Is it still the Prime Minister’s and the Chancellor’s ambition to raise the personal allowance?

[John Healey]

At the Budget last year, my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds West and Pudsey (Rachel Reeves) continued the freeze in the personal allowance, which was first brought in by the Conservatives, in order to help fund the improvements in health and schools that this country needs that the people voted for at the election just two years ago. We will keep all of this under review, as we always do. Reform is making promises that it simply cannot keep. The right hon. Gentleman is right that I have known him a long time; I say to him and to the country that he is also a man whose own party leader described as

“a man that believed in nothing”.

[Mr Speaker]

The Chancellor does not need to worry; he has no responsibility for Reform.

I call the shadow Minister.

[Dame Harriett Baldwin (West Worcestershire) (Con)]

I welcome the Chancellor to his new role. I paid close attention yesterday to the long speech he made to reset the narrative and drive growth Britain. In paying tribute to his predecessor, will he recognise that she left the highest tax burden on record? Instead of postponing the words he could utter to my hon. Friend the Member for Havant (Alan Mak), could he make a short speech today from the Dispatch Box to say that he does not plan to increase the tax burden further?

[John Healey]

I could have spoken a lot longer yesterday. I am grateful to the hon. Member for watching or reading it. In the two years of this Labour Government, we have started to see this country beginning to turn a corner. That is a corner after 14 years in which the previous Tory Governments had a record of low growth and high debt, and a mini-Budget that crashed the British economy and collapsed confidence in Britain’s fiscal strength. This country has huge strengths in its people, its businesses and its communities, who want to seize the future. This is a country in which interest rates have been cut six times since the election; in which borrowing, which is still too high, is down to a six-year low; in which growth—still fragile and under pressure—was fastest in the first half of this year in the G7; and in which productivity and investment are finally, after long Conservative years, beginning to tick up. That is the basis on which we now build.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.

[Daisy Cooper (St Albans) (LD)]

I welcome the Chancellor to his place. After two anti-growth Budgets, I genuinely wish him well and urge him to deliver a growth Budget this autumn, so that we can avoid more punishing tax rises or painful spending cuts.

Last week, the Prime Minister acknowledged that Brexit had ushered in a “decade of low growth” but did not outline what he thinks is needed to tackle it. On Monday, the Chancellor made what was briefed as a major economic speech on growth, the product of deep thinking, and yet there was barely a mention of the impact of Brexit. Recent studies suggest that deeper alignment with Europe could boost GDP by at least 2.5% to 3.6%, so should the Chancellor’s plan for growth not include the growth and defence partnership with the EU that we have called for?

[John Healey]

The hon. Lady is talking to the person who led the work to establish a defence and security partnership with the European Union and bilateral agreements with other countries, on which we now build both our economic strength and our national security strength.

On the question of the Budget, I ask the hon. Lady to look at what we have done in the seven weeks of this Government. We know that we cannot relieve the cost of living and the cost of business pressures, but we will take steps where we can to do that. I will take that principle into the Budget, and we will back business and do what we can to see growth in more places across the country, because for too long this country has relied on too few of our major cities to drive national growth.

[Dr Allison Gardner (Stoke-on-Trent South) (Lab)]

2. What steps he is taking with local leaders to attract private investment into areas that have historically received lower levels of investment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Connor Rand (Altrincham and Sale West) (Lab)]

4. What fiscal steps he is taking to support the renewal of high streets.

[The Chancellor of the Exchequer (John Healey)]

This is a Government who are determined to help good councils and businesses to breathe new life into our high streets and town centres. In April we introduced a permanent reduced tax rate worth almost £1 billion for high street businesses, and in July, in the new Prime Minister’s first week, he and I announced a further 20% cut for pubs, social clubs and music venues. This is a Government who will do what they can to help bring a bit of breathing space from the cost of living and the costs of business.

[Mr Rand]

In Altrincham and Sale West, we know how much our pubs and bars contribute to the local high streets of which we are so proud. That contribution goes beyond their economic impact; they create the sense of community that is so important to local people. The Government’s 20% cut in business rates was indeed welcome to them, but I know from events that I have held locally with the Altrincham business improvement district that they still face challenges and need more support. Will the Chancellor update the House on what more he will do to support all hospitality businesses in constituencies such as mine?

[John Healey]

My hon. Friend speaks up very strongly for his local area. He is right about the importance of pubs, social clubs and live venues, and about the importance of the 20% cut that we announced in July. These are the things that make the places where we live the places that we also love. Later this year the Government will produce our high street strategy, and I encourage my hon. Friend to contribute to the work of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government in that regard. I agree with what my right hon. Friend the Financial Secretary said a few moments ago: he should see the move that we made in July as a down payment on further reform.

[Graham Stuart (Beverley and Holderness) (Con)]

The Conservatives will save our high streets, and may I explain to the Chancellor why that is important? Donna, who ran the Beverly Card Company, saw this Labour Government increase her business rates from £135 a month to £840 a month. That is why in February, after 30 years of her running it and having won national awards, the business closed. She will have to make payments for the next four years for those business rates. Will the Chancellor stop trimming, support the Conservative plan and abolish business rates altogether for the 250,000 high street businesses? He needs to stop talking and sounding sympathetic, and actually do something that makes a difference to our high streets.

[John Healey]

What an extraordinary claim! It is hard to take seriously the idea that somehow the Conservatives will save our high streets. We are, of course, concerned about the impact of business taxation. As a Government, we have put in £4.3 billion to help cushion the changes, including in the right hon. Gentleman’s area. We are in the process of taking further steps to review and reform the business rates system, and I will be able to set out more details at the Budget.

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Minister.

[Gareth Davies (Grantham and Bourne) (Con)]

The Chancellor is going around lauding an apparent cut to business rates, but it was his Government who reduced business rates relief for retail, hospitality and leisure from 75% to 40%. If he goes out there and speaks to the owner of any average pub, they will tell him that their business rates have almost doubled. Why will he not answer the question as to why he cannot and will not follow the Conservative plan to cut Labour’s spiralling welfare bill to fund the abolishment of business rates for hundreds of thousands of high street businesses across our country?

[John Healey]

The Prime Minister and I have been clear that we must cut the costs of welfare. On levels of taxation, we had a period of Conservative Government, with low growth and high debt. They crashed the economy with the mini-Budget, and we had levels of taxation that were putting pressure on business, adding to the cost of living. What people have seen under this Government is a willingness to recognise those pressures and to do what we can—not to remove them, but to provide relief where we can. It is about giving people and families a bit of breathing space from the cost of living, and giving businesses a bit of breathing space from the costs of business. That is why the move that the Prime Minister and I made in July for pubs, social clubs and live venues was so welcomed.

[Alex McIntyre (Gloucester) (Lab)]

5. What assessment he has made of the potential impact of changes to regional funding arrangements on the economies of local communities which either are not part of a combined authority or do not have a metro mayor.

--- Later in debate ---

[Steff Aquarone (North Norfolk) (LD)]

T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

[The Chancellor of the Exchequer (John Healey)]

Since day one in the job, the Prime Minister and I have been in lockstep in our determination to meet Britain’s fiscal rules. This is the bedrock on which we build good growth and help give a bit of breathing space to families and businesses. We acted in the first week to cap bus fares, cut business rates for pubs, social clubs and live venues, and cut VAT on electricity bills. We have also announced further sanctions on Russia. We have changed procurement rules to back British jobs. We launched a new plan for growth from places right across the UK and £100 million to back British sovereign AI firms. This is a Labour Government who are determined to deliver good growth in every postcode and sound fiscal discipline.

[Steff Aquarone]

If the Treasury wants a quick trick to increase tax receipts from new employment, may I suggest that the Chancellor takes steps to boost rural bus connectivity? North Norfolk has independent operators such as Central Connect which, in spite of challenges facing the sector, has managed to double its bus frequency in Stalham and Hoveton. It wants to go further. Can he tell us how he will work with the Department for Transport to ensure barriers are lifted and support is provided to bring more buses to my constituents?

[John Healey]

I am disappointed that the hon. Gentleman did not recognise that capping bus fares must be a benefit to his constituency in Norfolk and a benefit to passengers. Beyond that, let me take his contribution as an early Budget representation.

--- Later in debate ---

[Andrew Griffith (Arundel and South Downs) (Con)]

Thank you, Mr Speaker. First, let me pay tribute to my own predecessor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Central Devon (Sir Mel Stride), and let me welcome the Chancellor to his role. He is already responsible for the highest borrowing costs for 28 years. One in six of our young people are unemployed and yesterday we had the news that one of Britain’s top taxpayers is leaving our country. Every time a billionaire leaves, our country becomes poorer. Chris Rokos is reported to have paid over £300 million in taxes last year. Could the Chancellor tell us how many average taxpayers it will take to replace him?

[John Healey]

I welcome the new shadow Chancellor to his place and thank him for his words. I welcome him back to the Treasury brief—perhaps Members on the Government Benches will have more to say about that later. I echo his comments about the right hon. Member for Central Devon (Sir Mel Stride), who has played an important role in this House, including his cross-party work during the pandemic as Chair of the Treasury Committee. We thank him for that as he steps down from the Front Bench.

The shadow Chancellor takes reports in the paper and tries to make serious points in this House. We will set out our plans at the Budget to give families and businesses a bit of breathing space, to back good growth in more places throughout this country, and to rebuild confidence in strong British fiscal discipline—something that was lost under the shadow Chancellor’s Government.

[Andrew Griffith]

The Chancellor does not know the answer. On the Treasury’s own statistics, it would take 38,000 average income tax payers to make up for the loss of Chris Rokos. That is a lot of breathing space paid for. It means higher taxes for everyone else, or lower public spending. We know what Labour will choose. The last Chancellor raised taxes on farmers, family businesses and jobs. Conservatives will reform welfare to cut taxes; Labour always puts them up. Which, if any, of his predecessor’s damaging decisions will the Chancellor reverse?

[John Healey]

The future of this country will be written in our growth rates, after 14 years in which we had low growth, high debt and a Budget that crashed confidence in the British economy. Under this Government, we have already seen a new way of generating growth in more places across the country. Members have seen the way that we will reform the centre of Whitehall, so that we cut through slow decision making, with public leadership and control made accountable to the people. I made announcements yesterday on the ways that we will go further to axe the thicket of administration, to back fast-growth firms, and to change the way that we generate investment across the country.

[Dr Jeevun Sandher (Loughborough) (Lab)]

T4. In areas such as mine in the east midlands, growth has been too low because spending has been too low. As life has become unaffordable, growth has fallen even further. We are seeing that with growth in my local area, as well as nationally, with a rising output gap. Will the Minister set out how making life affordable will make growth rise in Loughborough, Shepshed and the villages?

--- Later in debate ---

[Adam Thompson (Erewash) (Lab)]

T10. The Chancellor will no doubt be aware that this month marks the fourth anniversary of the disastrous Liz Truss mini-Budget, which risked my constituents’ pensions and locked thousands out of home ownership. Last week we saw Liz Truss’s Financial Secretary, the hon. Member for Arundel and South Downs (Andrew Griffith), made shadow Chancellor. Does my right hon. Friend have any advice for the shadow Chancellor on how he might learn from his mistakes?

[John Healey]

My hon. Friend is right that the Truss mini-Budget means that families with a new mortgage are now paying £600 a year more and the Government are paying more for our borrowing—money that we could be spending on schools and hospitals. The shadow Chancellor is the same man who at the weekend said that there were “lots of good things” in the Truss mini-Budget. With Labour, Britain is starting to turn the corner; it is clear that with a new shadow Chancellor, the Tories are turning back to Liz Truss.

[Rosie Duffield (Canterbury) (Ind)]

T7. This week, Professor Susan Ayers launches her report, “The Cost of Birth Trauma”, in Parliament. It is a first, as it goes beyond the more obvious health and social care implications, and follows the 2024 inquiry by the all-party parliamentary group on birth trauma. Lifelong care, litigation and the impact on the workplace come at a high price, as, of course, do many other women’s health scandals, such as the sodium valproate issue. Will the relevant Minister or the Chancellor read Susan Ayers’ report and meet me and the professor to discuss it?

--- Later in debate ---

[Sureena Brackenridge (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)]

I was pleased to see that the Chancellor was in the west midlands yesterday meeting manufacturing apprentices alongside Mayor Richard Parker. What conversations has he had with the mayor about using new devolution powers to invest in local skills and employment, and what will he do to make sure that young people in Wolverhampton North East get more local opportunities to benefit from?

[John Healey]

Indeed, the West Midlands Mayor, Richard Parker, is using the powers that he has, including recently by stepping in and taking action to improve bus services across the west midlands. Yesterday he stepped in to provide support for the Jaguar Land Rover workers who may face redundancy and will certainly be well placed to get further jobs.

[Sir Mel Stride (Central Devon) (Con)]

May I welcome the Chancellor to his position and thank him for his kind remarks earlier? May I also wish him every success, because I am afraid that under this Government we need some? He will know that if we are to fix the economy, we have to fix the welfare bill. Will he give a commitment today that at the Budget next month, he will come to the House with a comprehensive plan for how he will arrest the burgeoning welfare bill? He and I know that failure to do so will lead to millions of hard-working people and hundreds of thousands of businesses up and down the country facing unnecessary and unacceptable tax increases.

[John Healey]

The right hon. Gentleman sets out the challenge facing the country in the long term. That is exactly why we have commissioned Alan Milburn and the Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions, my right hon. Friend the Member for East Ham (Sir Stephen Timms) to do the reviews they are currently doing. When they produce them in the autumn, we will look at them and act on the recommendations.

[Mrs Sharon Hodgson (Washington and Gateshead South) (Lab)]

What conversations has the Chancellor had with the Department of Health and Social Care on providing compensation to those harmed by valporate and vaginal mesh, as per the Hughes report, which was published over two years ago?

Economic Growth

John Healey Excerpts

Monday 7th September 2026 Written Statements

[The Chancellor of the Exchequer (John Healey)]

The Government are committed to delivering good growth in every postcode of the United Kingdom.

Today I am setting out more detail on how we will deliver on this promise—in order that people and places see the benefits of this growth as soon as possible.

The UK has significant strengths and economic potential: life sciences, defence, technology, creative industries and financial services.

However, global instability continues to present challenges. Conflicts and trade tensions have driven up inflation and interest rates, while borrowing and debt costs have increased.

We have shown resilience in the face of these challenges: borrowing is falling; growth, although still fragile, was the fastest in the G7 in the first half of this year; and productivity is increasing.

In the context of continued global uncertainty, we must not become complacent. Fiscal credibility is indivisible from growth, and is my first priority.

The Prime Minister set out last week a clear diagnosis of what has gone wrong: political power was centralised, economic enablers have been privatised or outsourced, and the country deindustrialised.

The Government will change this through a fundamental shift that starts with restoring power and resources to local leaders to build infrastructure, boost private investment and develop local industrial strategies. This will unlock the potential of their region to do the things they do best in a way that Whitehall simply cannot. Greater public control through a more effective and strategic state at all levels will enhance oversight of the essentials. This will create the conditions for a new civic partnership between Government, business and academia. Alongside this, national policy on investment, innovation and jobs will create the right conditions for the private sector.

The UK has had the lowest investment rate among G7 countries for most of the last 20 years, and the regional disparities between current levels of public investment per head are too great. We have made progress recently but need to do more. This includes sharpening the focus of our public financial institutions to align with this Government’s priorities, reducing unnecessary consultation, litigation and administration, and changing the Green Book to support projects with more long-term potential in places across the country.

The UK has a strong record on innovation: world leaders in frontier technologies, including quantum, nuclear fusion and space technology; as well as AI—a general-purpose technology that requires oversight but also brings great opportunity. The Government will earmark dedicated funds to back British innovation through public investment, procurement and closer co-operation between local leaders, universities, investors and businesses. It will strengthen support for high-growth businesses and emerging technologies, with the ambition of doubling the number of unicorn firms in this country.

We need to take advantage of our human potential and recognise that skills and labour markets vary across the country. The Prime Minister has set out his plan on technical education. We are moving funding and power for the skills system to local areas to improve work experience and employment opportunities for young people, tailored to the needs and strengths of places. This autumn, Alan Milburn will set out his full recommendations to the Government on how to address the blight of youth unemployment.

These measures will increase investment, accelerate innovation and support more people into work, ultimately raising productivity and growth.

[HCWS312]

Community Debt Advice Services

John Healey Excerpts

Wednesday 1st December 2021 Westminster Hall

[Emma Hardy]

As I mentioned at the start, my right hon. Friend has been with me from the beginning, looking at this issue and campaigning on it. She is absolutely right. I accept that some people might want to access more virtual appointments and information on a website, but it cannot come at the expense of the face-to-face component. We cannot lose that face-to-face part.

MaPS is changing the way funding is provided. Although, it is increasing the money for debt advice—I want to acknowledge that, and it is set to increase to £77 million in April 2022—the bulk of that funding is moving to call centres and online services. At a meeting on 17 November, the MaPS chief executive and commissioning team told We Are Debt Advisers, which is a group representing debt advisers, that 20% of the £77 million had been allocated to face-to-face appointments. That amounts to £15.4 million. They also said that regional providers currently spend 56% of their existing £33 million on delivering this way, which is £18.5 million. By their own admission, this is a cut of just over £3 million to face-to-face services. That is made worse by the replacement of the grant system with contracting, which in its current form will exclude many smaller providers active in the sector from being able to bid for contracts at all.

[John Healey (Wentworth and Dearne) (Lab)]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for all her work on this issue. She makes a powerful point about the shift in priority, and therefore funding, from face-to-face debt advice to online and telephone advice. In South Yorkshire, there are currently 28 funded face-to-face debt advisers, but that will go down to seven. Pre pandemic, in Rotherham alone, the number of new face-to-face debt inquiries each year was 2,200. In the context that she has set out of rising prices, bills and taxes, she might question Ministers whether, if the Treasury or MaPS have evidence to suggest that the demand for face-to-face debt advice will go down, not up, and to justify these cuts, they will publish that, and then we will all be better informed and more confident about the future.

[Emma Hardy]

I thank my right hon. Friend, who has been campaigning on this issue from the very beginning. He is absolutely right: all the forecasts—all of them—show that demand for debt advice will only increase. We know that. We also know that cases can be complex and that it can sometimes be the first time that people have got into debt. So the idea that we would cut face-to-face advice at this time seems incomprehensible.

Under the new tender, MaPS will instead have three national contracts. Its staff met me—I credit them for that—and said that these will be a mix of face-to-face, digital and phone services, with one each for the north, the midlands and the south of England, and a separate arrangement for a national call centre. However, three regional contracts, instead of nine smaller ones, as it was before, means that small, local providers that currently rely on MaPS funding for the bulk of their income face having to drop face-to-face services or close entirely. Many already know that they are not included in tender bids because they do not have the size or resources to compete individually for these tenders. Sylvia Simpson, chair of the Leeds Debt Advice Network, described the impact as “catastrophic”, with three out of four local MaPS-funded debt agencies no longer able to provide debt advice after 31 March. There are serious doubts about the rationale for the decision to restructure funding. Where is the evidence to support it and its timing? Does MaPS have confidence in the outcome itself?

Debt advisers tell me that there has been no proper consultation. In the face of the national outcry from debt advice organisations, charities and trade unions, MaPS issued a two-week call for evidence concerning the impact of the covid-19 pandemic on access to debt advice. That concluded on 29 October, but the procurement exercise for the new contracts had already taken place. The consultation will not influence a procurement process that has already gone on, so what was its purpose? It is clear that the procurement exercise expected bidders to focus on digital and telephone-based services rather than face-to-face services, despite MaPS’ own evidence showing that demand for face-to-face services was almost double supply.

A 2019 MaPS assessment of the need for debt advice said:

“Face-to-face is the channel with the smallest gap between demand and supply at the national level. Nevertheless, the levels of unmet demand are high, with demand being over two times higher than supply. It is also the channel with the biggest variation in unmet demand between countries and regions. Face-to-face unmet demand is particularly high in London, where existing supply of face-to-face debt advice could meet only just over a fifth of current demand.”

MaPS does not seem to have evidence that the need for face-to-face services will fall. On 29 November, in reply to a letter sent on 16 November from the Chair of the Treasury Committee, the right hon. Member for Central Devon (Mel Stride), MaPS provided figures showing that, for the last pre-pandemic year, 2019-20, face-to-face services accounted for 34% of its consultations. That fell by only 3 percentage points, to 31%, in 2020-21, despite the fact, let us not forget, that this was during a global pandemic that involved lockdowns, compulsory mask wearing, the adoption of social distancing and people being afraid to leave their homes. Despite all that, the demand for face-to-face debt advice fell by only three percentage points. In its letter to the Treasury Committee, MaPS notes that its most recent modelling of future demand is from autumn 2020 which, as we will remember all too well, was just before another national lockdown and before the pandemic’s third wave brutally hit, killing thousands of people in our country. That is when the modelling was done. MaPS does not say whether the modelling includes the impact of the pandemic, but I think we can assume it probably did not.

On the importance of face-to-face appointments, MaPS said that the forecast

“did not make distinctions between case complexity or channel of provision.”

If someone has a simple debt inquiry, they would probably google it and look on a website, or they might phone someone up and check. If their case is extremely complex—I refer to my earlier points on domestic abuse, mental health and such concerns—accessing a website is not going to be suitable. MaPS needs to be looking at complex cases and how it provides support.

In other words, the modelling does not tell MaPS how much demand for face-to-face appointments to expect, and the contract does not give it control over how much can be provided. MaPS claims that changes will increase accessibility to advice in those difficult-to-reach places, but those changes could mean the opportunity for face-to-face advice would no longer exist in some areas of the country. I accept—I was discussing this point with the Minister earlier—that some areas could end up with more access to advice, but that is at the expense of other areas.

In the letter, MaPS mentions an equalities and vulnerability impact assessment. That has not been made available and I hope the Minister is able to use his influence to say to MaPS that it should be published. At the moment, MaPS is saying to me, “We do not know, because we are still commissioning. We are not sure how much will be face to face; we are not sure how much will be on the phone or remote. We haven’t made any decisions.” If that is true and it does not know where it is going to end up, how can it have done an equalities and vulnerability impact assessment? When MaPS has made up its mind about what it wants, I assume another impact assessment will be needed. I hope that one is made public.

I hope I have explained clearly why face-to-face advice is the only way of supporting a significant proportion of people in debt, and why a reduction in capacity and coverage will fail some of the most vulnerable in our society. I hope that MaPS does more to reach out more effectively to practitioners with a lifetime of experience and knowledge in the field. Debt advice groups such as AdviceUK believe that MaPS’ vision for debt advice is deeply flawed, does not meet the needs of the diverse communities across England and does not enable the provision of flexible, in-depth and sustainable debt advice services.

MaPS cannot explain why it has made the funding allocations it has done or what impact they will have on people with complex needs. Of course, the pandemic has been a huge disrupter. Its effects are still being played out and the future remains hard to predict, but we do know that there will be an increase in the number of families in debt. We know that we are only beginning to see the devastating impact of the cost of living crisis. I hope the Minister is able to use all the influence he has—accepting, of course, that MaPS is a separate organisation and that this is a commercial contract—to call on MaPS to place an immediate hold on the procurement of new debt advice contracts, pending a thorough and effective consultation into the likely demand for face-to-face services in the near future; and to insist that there should be no loss of debt adviser jobs and an increase in funding for community-based face-to-face services. Consultation with frontline advisers through their trade union should also be essential for all future decisions affecting jobs and service delivery.

I finish by reminding the Minister of my earlier comment: more than 100,000 people attempt suicide each year because of debt. The services these organisations provide can literally be life-saving. Having the right debt advice is too important to get wrong.

Small Breweries Relief

John Healey Excerpts

Monday 9th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Grahame Morris (Easington) (Lab)]

I congratulate and thank the right hon. Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd (Liz Saville Roberts). With a name like “Morris”, I should really be able to speak Welsh, and I am fifth generation Welsh. We are discussing a really important subject and I am pleased to have the opportunity to make a few brief points in this debate which, unexpectedly, is a little longer than originally planned.

It is tempting to lapse into puns and humour, but this is a serious business. As you know, Mr Deputy Speaker, I love beer, me—I love Indian pale ale, I love the ruby reds, I love a craft lager. I love all beers. Tonight we are talking not about the mass production of the big six brewers; we are talking about small breweries of which there are 90 in Wales, and 2,500 across the country, including Castle Eden Brewery—I must mention my one brewery, or they would never forgive me, and it produces what is probably among the finest beer in the world.

[John Healey (Wentworth and Dearne) (Lab)]

What’s it called?

[Grahame Morris]

Castle Eden ale. I highly recommend it.

As the right hon. Lady indicated, we are talking about the important issue of whether the Government, intentionally or unintentionally, are introducing anti-competitive practices. It has been suggested, perhaps not without foundation, that the large breweries have the ear of Ministers. Let us be in no doubt: the abolition of small breweries relief will be the death knell for many small brewers across the country, including in Wales and the whole United Kingdom.

As has rightly been pointed out, the introduction of small breweries relief led to a renaissance in British brewing. Those reforms should go towards strengthening the small, independent and craft brewers that we are so proud of, and that tourists and indigenous people on these islands love in equal measure. I hope that the Government will not make any changes to breweries that produce below 5,000 hectolitres, as to do so would threaten our craft beer industry, and local jobs in constituencies such as mine. Even worse, consumers such as me would ultimately lose out, with less variety and choice of beer. We should celebrate the diversity of brewers and different beers and tastes, and we should not do anything that will jeopardise that.

I worry that the decision to convert small breweries relief from a percentage to a cash basis threatens the long-term value of that rate, if it does not keep pace with the main rate. We get lost in numbers. What does 5,000 hectolitres mean? That is 3,000 old brewers barrels. My brewery, Castle Eden Brewery, produces just over 3,000 barrels, or 5,000 hectolitres. Compare that not with one of the big six or big four that produce millions of hectolitres, but with Camerons Brewery in Hartlepool, which is a producer of fine beer and produces 1 million hectolitres. It is impossible for a small brewery to compete with the economies of scale that a large brewery can bring to bear. Unless careful thought is given to it, the taper above 5,000 hectolitres will effectively bring an end to this prized and valued sector.

I promised to be brief, so I have just a couple of questions for the Minister, having listened to several debates and questions on the issue. Does she accept that cutting the threshold will lead to small breweries paying more duty? Does she understand that that will result in some small breweries closing? We must remember that the premise of the relief was that it would be revenue-neutral. How will she judge the success of the policy: by the number of UK small breweries, by the number of people employed by the industry, or by the reduction in market share of the big four that dominate? I would very much like to know what the Treasury’s objections are and how it will measure success.

Budget Resolutions

John Healey Excerpts

Thursday 23rd November 2017 Commons Chamber

[John Healey (Wentworth and Dearne) (Lab)]

The Chancellor said today in the media that the economy is fundamentally strong, but he said in the Budget statement yesterday that the economy is weakening and getting worse. That is the hard truth that confronts and challenges all of us.

This has been a serious debate, with 31 speakers, after a Budget that confirmed that these are serious times for the country. We have had growth downgraded to below 2% each year for the next five years, for the first time in recent history; productivity downgraded by 0.6% a year for the next four years, which the Office for Budget Responsibility rightly calls a “remarkable period of weakness”; business investment downgraded and subdued for the next four years; and earnings downgraded, with the Resolution Foundation showing that pay is now not set to recover to pre-global financial crisis levels until 2025—17 wasted years.

My hon. Friend the Member for West Bromwich West (Mr Bailey) was right: the big story yesterday was the OBR’s damning judgment on the economy and the Budget. My hon. Friend the Member for Ilford North (Wes Streeting), one of Labour’s strongest, clearest voices on the economy, said the same.

I wish to pick up on some of the points made today about the implications and impact of the Budget. A number of colleagues on both sides of the House spoke about the fact that the Government had raised expectations of lifting the public sector pay cap but then, after seven years of falling income for public servants, dashed those expectations. My hon. Friend the Member for Reading East (Matt Rodda) made that point, and my hon. Friend the Member for Lincoln (Ms Lee) spoke powerfully about the reality of work on the wards in Lincoln hospital. I enjoyed the comment of the hon. Member for Glasgow South West (Chris Stephens) about the Chancellor having a matt finish and a Budget that was more of the same. He also spoke about the need for a pay rise for public service workers, as did my hon. Friend the Member for Clwyd South (Susan Elan Jones), who said that the current situation does a grave disservice to public servants such as Mrs Davies who give their life to working for others. The hon. Members for Aberdeen North (Kirsty Blackman) and for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss), who are no longer in their places, made the same point.

The right hon. Member for Sevenoaks (Sir Michael Fallon) made a series of important points about the longer-term structural changes that are needed beyond the Budget to encourage savings, to spread the benefits of quantitative easing more widely and to reform business rates, which, as the hon. Member for Stafford (Jeremy Lefroy) said, too often still bear down too heavily on small and medium-sized firms.

My hon. Friend the Member for Blaenau Gwent (Nick Smith) talked about the problems that steelworkers in the British Steel pension fund face, with a lack of clear information or a clear guarantee for the future. I hope the Government will respond to that.

Good luck to the hon. Member for Taunton Deane (Rebecca Pow) in her bid to get traditional cider makers recognised by the Chancellor. Having been the Minister responsible for excise duties at one point, I am right behind her on that. Actually, cider duty was frozen for the first time when I was the Exchequer Secretary, and it made a big difference to cider makers in the south-west, as they will confirm.

A number of hon. Members—including my hon. Friend the Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman), who is not in his place—made important points about how there was so little for the north of England, and how the greatest gaps are between the regions of this country. My hon. Friend the Member for Bradford South (Judith Cummins) spoke about the problems and pressures faced by Bradford Council. The hon. Member for Cleethorpes (Martin Vickers) quite rightly said that national housing and other policies are too often skewed towards the concerns of London. My hon. Friend the Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport (Luke Pollard) was right to ask why the far south-west was ignored in this Budget when it came to investment, the NHS and the armed forces.

The hon. Member for Stirling (Stephen Kerr) claimed that the Budget was good for Scotland, but in the end it will be the Scottish people who decide that. The hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) was quite right to argue that people in Northern Ireland need a functioning Northern Ireland Assembly to make the best of what he sees in the Budget, and to push for what is not in it. Finally, my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle (Emma Hardy) made a powerful speech to back a powerful campaign against the use of mesh, and I really hope that the Government were listening carefully.

Much of the debate was about what is in the Budget and what is happening to the economy. The real question for us all, though, is: why? Why are Britain’s real wage growth, productivity levels and economic growth prospects so much worse than those of other major countries? The OBR is clear that by far the biggest contribution to the major downgrade of growth prospects is the huge reduction in productivity, equivalent to 3% of our national economic output over the next five years. My hon. Friend the Member for Huddersfield said that that is a long-run problem, and, to be fair, all Governments have grappled with it.

During the period that I spent in the Treasury, we tried to support the five drivers of productivity by encouraging enterprise, raising skills, improving competition, funding R&D, science and innovation, and boosting investment. The Government have been in power for seven years, and it is clear that many of the problems have got a great deal worse during that time.

It is also clear that George Osborne got it wrong. What he thought was clever politics trumped sound economics. He cut too far, he choked off the recovery and he undermined our economic foundations. On enterprise, he scrapped the regional development agencies, which supported competitiveness, business and skills in all parts of the country. On skills, he cut training and education budgets by 14% in real terms, according to the IFS; that was an unprecedented cut. On competition, he did nothing to deal with the industries—including house building, energy and water—that are dominated by a few big providers.

On funding for R&D and science, spending on R&D has simply flatlined; it has been well below the OECD average in the last seven years. Finally, on investment, the Government—they were supported by the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government when he was in the Treasury—halved public sector investment as a percentage of GDP in the first years of the Parliament after 2010; it fell from 3.4% of GDP in 2009-10 to 1.7% in 2015. The hon. Member for Faversham and Mid Kent (Helen Whately) talked, in a rather gushing speech, about how the Government were investing for the future. But the Budget pushes up the level of public sector investment by only 0.1% over the whole Parliament.

We are seeing the legacy of the decisions made in 2010, with the country paying the price and the current Chancellor playing catch-up. What is needed is a deep and big change—a proper national living wage, rising to £10 an hour; a national investment bank that will back businesses right across the country; and a long-term investment plan, especially for housing.

Let me finish with some comments on housing. I pay tribute to my hon. Friends the Members for Brentford and Isleworth (Ruth Cadbury), for Brighton, Kemptown (Lloyd Russell-Moyle) and for Vale of Clwyd (Chris Ruane), and to the hon. Member for North Devon (Peter Heaton-Jones). I am sorry that I have not been able to deal with the other points on housing.

The serious problem underpinning everything in the Government’s strategy was made very clear by the hon. Member for Isle of Wight (Mr Seely). We have never built the homes this country needs because we have slashed Government capital investment in homes and outsourced responsibility for building the new homes we need to the big developers. That is the fundamental flaw in the Government’s strategy. It has been the fundamental flaw for seven years, and it is the fundamental flaw of this Budget.

If we are to build not just the number of new homes we need to fix this country’s housing crisis, but the range of new homes we need to deal with seven years of housing failure on all fronts, we must do more to bring public sector investment, effort and action alongside the private sector. The Budget confirmed that this is a Government without a plan to fix the housing crisis.