The Growth Plan

Debate between Kwasi Kwarteng and Richard Burgon

Friday 23rd September 2022 Commons Chamber

[Kwasi Kwarteng]

We are focused on growth, and it is through growth that that young person will get more opportunities and more benefits and have a much better funded public sector.

[Richard Burgon (Leeds East) (Lab)]

Are not tax cuts for the richest and bigger bonuses for bankers the classic trickle-down con trick? The wealth will not trickle down. In fact, it will be sucked up into fewer and fewer hands. Will the Chancellor not admit that that is what this statement is designed to do? The Tories are acting like Robin Hood in reverse, taking from the poor and giving to the rich. Is that not appalling when people across the country—people out there—are really suffering during this cost of living emergency?

[Kwasi Kwarteng]

There are three big measures that are helping tens of millions of people up and down the country: first, the energy intervention announced by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister last week; secondly, the reversal of the national insurance planned increase; and thirdly, the acceleration—the bringing forward—of the 1p cut in the basic rate. The hon. Gentleman should be welcoming those measures and not playing to the gallery with his tired old socialist rhetoric.