Kwasi Kwarteng
Main Page: Kwasi Kwarteng (Conservative - Spelthorne)Department Debates - View all Kwasi Kwarteng's debates with the HM Treasury
(11 years, 5 months ago)
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Kwasi Kwarteng (Spelthorne) (Con)
How much money does the hon. Lady expect to raise through a tax on bank bonuses, and how does she think it could be spent on the projects on which she wants to spend it?
Cathy Jamieson
We have consistently said that we would seek to use the tax specifically to provide a jobs guarantee for every young person who has been out of work for a year or more. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman, and indeed most Members in all parts of the House, will have met—or received e-mails, letters or telephone calls from—young people who are absolutely desperate to be given that first start, to walk through the doorway, to show what they can do, to use their skills and to learn more. Sadly, as we have heard, the guarantees provided under the Work programme have not met expectations, so it is important for us to think about what we could do. In March this year—
Cathy Jamieson
I want to finish what I am saying. In March this year, 167,000 adults had been out of work for more than two years. The figure has increased by 97% since 2012, and by 216% since 2011. We believe that the way to get people back into work is to tax the very richest. I am sure that Members in all parts of the House would agree—
Cathy Jamieson
I want to finish what I am saying, and I want to make progress. I think that I have been reasonably generous with my time so far.
I am sure that Members in all parts of the House would agree that returning people to work is the best way of reducing the benefits bill and getting the economy moving again. However, the facts speak for themselves, showing that the Government prioritise those at the top and leave everyone else to struggle. Let me return to what my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne) said earlier.
Cathy Jamieson
No; I really do want to put this on the record. As my hon. Friend said, a two-earner couple with children are losing an average of £1,869 while a millionaire receives a tax cut. Would the hon. Gentleman care to explain to a two-earner couple with children in his constituency why that is fair?
Kwasi Kwarteng
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for giving way. I did not catch the answer to my earlier question. How much money in a fiscal year does the hon. Lady expect to raise from the bank bonus tax?
Cathy Jamieson
I note that the hon. Gentleman showed no inclination to explain to that two-earner couple with children in his constituency why it is right for a millionaire to receive a tax cut at a time when they are set to lose a significant amount of money.
Cathy Jamieson
No. I am going to finish what I am saying, because I want to make clear the extent to which people are losing out. The future jobs fund gave opportunities to many young people and it was short-sighted of the Government to scrap it. It seemed to me that the Government did so simply because it was brought in by the previous Government. However, following questions in the House and elsewhere, we know that the Work programme has not delivered for many young people in our constituencies.
I go back to the fact that individuals and families are losing out in our constituencies. Not only will a two-earner couple with children lose on average £1,869, while a millionaire gets a tax cut, but a single parent who works and has tried to do the right thing in getting into employment and holding down a job, as well as meeting their caring responsibilities, will lose £1,226. At the same time, the millionaire banker about whom we talked earlier will see his tax bill cut. Two earners without children who are a couple will lose £672.
Those are remarkable figures. As I said earlier, they sum up the coalition’s warped sense of priorities. They are looking after those at the top, while making everyone else pay the price for their economic failure.
Cathy Jamieson
I will in a moment.
No wonder that people think that there is one rule for the richest and another for the rest. No wonder people are questioning why the Government believe that the way to motivate people on low incomes is to pay them less, and the way to motivate people on high incomes is to pay them more. In these challenging economic times, surely we should focus on supporting those who need it most. New clause 8 asks the Government to look at the issue again. We are asking them to undertake a proper assessment of the impact of the cut, as well as an analysis of how much the Treasury would gain if the additional rate were returned to 50% in 2014-15. That is not an unreasonable request. I hope that, on this occasion, the Government will accept the new clause and report back in due course, although I suspect that that may not be the case.
I outlined earlier why the Opposition think that the Chancellor’s logic is rather odd. He claims to find tax avoidance morally repugnant and to want to crack down on it, but this tax cut simply rewards the wealthiest. He appears to justify it on the ground that the behavioural response to the 50p rate was more avoidance. There seems to be a rather strange logic here. Instead of cracking down on the avoidance, he is rewarding it. Surely those are not the values that we want in the Government: one rule for the richest and another for the rest of us.
It is not what the Government used to say, before their façade of fairness began to slip. The Prime Minister no less said:
“I have been very clear—we have all been very clear—that we have to do this in a way that is fair so that the broadest backs bear the biggest burden.
That is why we haven’t changed… the 50p tax rate.”
However, the Government are giving those with the broadest backs a tax cut, while people on lower incomes are shouldering the bigger burden. I heard Government Members supporting what the Prime Minister said. It is a pity that they now seem to have gone back on that.
Cathy Jamieson
If the hon. Gentleman can contain himself for a few more moments, I would like to quote the Chancellor. I am sure he will want to hear what his own Chancellor said. Indeed, he may even have been at his party’s conference when the Chancellor said this:
“We could not even think of abolishing the 50p rate on the rich while at the same time I am asking many of our public sector workers to accept a pay freeze to protect their jobs. I think we can all agree that would be grossly unfair.”
Does the hon. Gentleman agree that would be grossly unfair?
Kwasi Kwarteng
The hon. Lady will know that I have always consistently argued for lower tax rates across the board, so that is my answer to her point. I am also perplexed as to why she will not give an answer to my earlier question about the amount of money she hoped to raise from a bankers bonus tax, given that that is such a key element of her party’s fiscal plans.
Cathy Jamieson
Once again, it is rather strange that the hon. Gentleman does not seek to give any comfort to his own constituents or give any explanation of his own policies. We have put forward the idea of the bankers bonus tax to get young people back into employment, and I also think the general public would like those bonuses to be less than they have been over the past few years.
I want to go back to the point the Chancellor made. He said at his party conference that he would not
“think of abolishing the 50p rate on the rich while at the same time…asking many of our public sector workers to accept a pay freeze”.
I do not often agree with the Chancellor, but I do think he was right then—and that he is absolutely wrong now.
In the interests of balance, however, I should also quote what is perhaps my favourite of these interventions. It was made by the Chief Secretary to the Treasury—the Lib Dem Chief Secretary. He summed things up quite neatly when he said:
“People who think that the priority for this Government should be reducing the tax burden on the very wealthiest are living in cloud cuckoo land.”
So in the words of the Government’s own Chief Secretary to the Treasury, this is a decision from cloud cuckoo land. I think that many members of the public would agree with that.
No doubt Government Members will protest and say that the higher rate was not raising any money—
Cathy Jamieson
No, I want to move on. I have been very generous in taking interventions, and it is important that I now move on to make the many points I have not yet had the opportunity to put on the record.
As I have said, no doubt Government Members will protest and say that the higher rate was not raising any money due to tax avoidance, but the Institute for Fiscal Studies has said:
“By giving out £3 billion to well-off people who pay 50p tax…the Government is banking on a very, very uncertain amount of people changing their behaviour and paying more tax as a result of the fact that you’re taxing them—”
Cathy Jamieson
I want at least to get to the end of that quote—that would be quite nice. I would like other Members to have the opportunity to contribute to the debate; indeed, I am sure the hon. Gentleman is gearing himself up for that as we speak.
Just in case anyone missed that IFS quote, let me make clear what it said:
“By giving out £3 billion to well-off people who pay 50p tax…the Government is banking on a very, very uncertain amount of people changing their behaviour and paying more tax as a result of the fact that you’re taxing them…There is a lot of uncertainty, a lot of risk on this estimate.”
I know that Government Members will from time to time quote the IFS and will, from time to time, doubt its figures. Just in case they do not accept what the IFS has said, let us look at what the Office for Budget Responsibility has said about this issue. It said that any decrease in tax avoidance from the reduced rate would be “highly uncertain”. A written answer from the Exchequer Secretary in the summer of 2012 stated that in 2010-11 70% of people earning over £250,000 were paying more than 40% in tax and 80% of people earning between £500,000 and £10 million were paying the 50p rate. Each and every one of those people is now in line for the tax cut.
Cathy Jamieson
The reality for my constituents and those of Labour Members is that they want to know why the Government made the change in the first place. They want to see action taken in the future, but there are two years until the general election—we will lay out how we intend to take things forward in good time for that—and I respectfully suggest to Government Members that we do not know exactly what sort of mess we will be left with. We see no responsibility taken by the Government for the situation that the economy is in at the moment and what has happened on their watch—
Cathy Jamieson
I hear yet again that tired mantra from Conservative Members, as if, somehow, Labour created the global financial crisis—
Chris Leslie
Yes, I agree. Governments often ask Oppositions how they will pay for tax cuts for those who need them most. We have given a clear example of one possible option. It is important to show that there is a fair way to give a tax cut to the vast majority of lower and middle-income households through the introduction of the new 10p band. The mansion tax is feasible and has cross-party support, as indeed does the 10p starting rate, and the Minister’s arguments are diminishing by the day, to the extent that we have managed to get him to lift the skirt of the data and publish more of them, which is what we want to see.
It is important to consider the arguments for fairness behind the 10p starting rate, which we think would provide a good tax incentive into work, especially for those on lower incomes. It is widely supported, especially by those Conservative Members who were champing at the bit only a matter of months ago when they tried to persuade the Chancellor and the Prime Minister to consider the proposal. Conservative Back Benchers have managed to get the Government on the run on their favoured topics, including an EU referendum and a tax break for married couples. They have the bit between their teeth, so perhaps we can persuade them to consider the 10p tax rate, too.
The principle of fair taxation is at stake in this debate. It should transcend party differences. We should be looking at funding a tax cut, not defending the wealth of the wealthiest. If the Government really mean it when they say that we are all in this together, the time has come for a mansion tax to help those most in need. The Government have a history of giving tax cuts to the wealthiest—they have already reduced the 50p rate, thereby giving millionaires a tax cut—and they have hit pensioners with what came to be known as the granny tax.
Kwasi Kwarteng
If the 10p rate is such a good idea, why did the previous Labour Government get rid of it?
Chris Leslie
I did say earlier—I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman was in the Chamber—that it was a mistake to get rid of it in 2007. There were arguments. The Institute for Fiscal Studies looked at the issues. The basic rate of income tax had been reduced and calculations had to be made about how to pay for it. I think, however, that the right thing to do is to take these steps and have progressivity in the income tax scale.
It is wrong to hurt those in society who are most in need. They are paying the price and life is getting harder for them because the Government’s economic plan has failed. We need to concentrate on the contribution that the wealthiest 1% in society should make. They should pay a fairer share and we should make sure that that money goes to the vast majority—25 million people—on lower and middle incomes.