Kelvin Hopkins
Main Page: Kelvin Hopkins (Independent - Luton North)Department Debates - View all Kelvin Hopkins's debates with the HM Treasury
(13 years, 2 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Jesse Norman (Hereford and South Herefordshire) (Con)
7. What recent estimate he has made of the level of central Government debt.
Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab)
In 1945, Britain had higher Government debt than now and the Government of that time did not impose cuts but ran a full-employment economy and there was rapid growth. Is it not time that the Government took a leaf out of Labour’s book in relation to running the economy?
Mr Gauke
May I just make the point about the 1945 Government that they were running surpluses from 1948 onwards? If memory serves, the debt in 1945 was 232% of GDP and by 1951 it was 178% of GDP, so they brought debt down. That is not a bad thing to do and this Government want to do it, whereas the Labour party wants to put debt up.