Kate Green
Main Page: Kate Green (Labour - Stretford and Urmston)Department Debates - View all Kate Green's debates with the HM Treasury
(14 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Osborne
It is not a bad test of the policy offered to the Government from the Opposition to consider what would happen if we actually did it tomorrow. If the shadow Chancellor stood up tomorrow, or if I adopted his plan, and announced that the UK was backing off its fiscal consolidation plan and that it would take much longer, where do we actually think the UK would be within about 30 minutes of that statement?
Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)
I am naturally pleased that the number of job losses in the public sector has been revised downwards, but I am very concerned that it seems that the £18 billion of welfare cuts, which will affect the poorest, will be picking up the price tag. Was that the Chancellor’s explicit decision and policy, and if so does he think it was fair?
Mr Osborne
I do of course think the spending review was fair, but as I said at the time—[Interruption.] If the Opposition would actually produce a spending review, perhaps we could compare the two—but they do not want to do that.
The point I was making to the hon. Lady is that I said at the time of the Budget and the spending review that I was making a conscious decision to seek further welfare reform to try to reduce the rapidly escalating costs of the welfare state. That was a challenge that anyone doing my job would face, and I said that if we were able to find further welfare reforms, we would be able to reduce the cuts in Departments, and that is exactly what we were able to do.