Income tax (charge)

Debate between John Whittingdale and Sarah Russell

Thursday 31st October 2024 Commons Chamber

[Sir John Whittingdale (Maldon) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Dagenham and Rainham (Margaret Mullane), who made an excellent speech. She spoke with knowledge and passion about her constituency and about the challenges that face the residents of Dagenham and Rainham. Hers is a constituency I know well, since I drive back to my own on the A13 every week. Sometimes, when it is closed, as happened last week, I find myself exploring even more of Dagenham and Rainham. I also congratulate the hon. Member for Worcester (Tom Collins), who also made a very good contribution. We look forward to hearing from both of them in the future.

I want to start by putting on record the thanks that I think are due to my right hon. Friend the Member for Godalming and Ash (Jeremy Hunt), the shadow Chancellor, and my right hon. Friend the Member for Richmond and Northallerton (Rishi Sunak), the former Prime Minister. One of the extraordinary things I have found in the Budget speech that we are debating is the complete failure to mention the two extraordinary challenges that the Government had to face: covid and the economic consequences of Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.

Those two events combined potentially threatened the survival of every business in this country and could have led to a catastrophic increase in the cost of living for ordinary people. It was only through the intervention of the then Government in providing support that we managed to keep the economy going and that those businesses and the jobs associated with them survived. I find the Chancellor’s failure even to mention that challenge when talking about the economic legacy extraordinary. It has left us with a legacy, but despite the level of borrowing that was necessary, the Government were bringing it down and had restored the economy. I think that when the history books are written, a lot of credit will be given to my right hon. Friends the shadow Chancellor and the former Prime Minister.

[Mrs Sarah Russell (Congleton) (Lab)]

Does the right hon. Member accept that the Conservative Government’s decisions to reduce gas storage and to fail to invest in the NHS over long periods made dealing with those crises considerably worse?

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)]

Order. Before the right hon. Member responds, interventions are a healthy part of debate, but the hon. Lady should draw the attention of the Member by speaking loudly in asking for an intervention.