Finance Bill

Lord Austin of Dudley Excerpts

Tuesday 28th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gauke]

If the hon. Gentleman is prepared to be patient, I will set out the Government’s position.

If we are to address poverty, it is important that we address not just poverty but the causes of poverty—to coin a phrase—and ensure that work pays, and that is what our welfare reform programme is designed to do. It is also important that we take steps to ensure that the family and marriage are recognised, and that we do what we can to support stable relationships.

[Ian Austin (Dudley North) (Lab)]

Under the Minister’s proposals, if a man abandoned his wife and children and got remarried, would he continue to receive the tax allowance? If a woman were widowed, would she lose it?

[Mr Gauke]

Let me set out—[Hon. Members: “Ah!”] Let me set out the point. As has been said many times during this debate, marriage is recognised in the vast majority of countries. The previous Government introduced the transferable nil-rate band for inheritance, which was specifically designed to assist married couples and civil partnerships. If the Labour party is against any kind of recognition of marriage within the tax system—

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[Ian Austin]

rose—

[Mr Gauke]

Let me finish this point. If the Labour party is against any kind of recognition of marriage within the tax system, why did it introduce the transferable nil-rate band for inheritance tax?

[Ian Austin]

rose—

[Mr Gauke]

Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will explain. [Interruption.]

[Ian Austin]

Would a woman whose husband was killed in Afghanistan lose this benefit?

[Mr Gauke]

As I sat down to give way to the hon. Member for Dudley North (Ian Austin), the shadow Chancellor said, “You don’t have to be married to benefit from the transferable nil-rate band.” He is absolutely right. As I said, it applies to married couples and those in a civil partnership. That is exactly what I said earlier. As the hon. Member for Dudley North pointed out, it is important that we support widows in the circumstances he mentioned. Does that mean, though, that we should never do anything for married couples? It does not necessarily follow.

I want to put this in the wider context of what we are doing to help strong and stable families. For example, the Department for Education has announced plans to spend £30 million on relationship support to deliver better support for couples in relationship distress. However, as hon. Members will be aware, the Government have made it clear that we intend to introduce proposals to recognise marriage and civil partnerships in the tax system. As the Prime Minister said recently, this will show that as a country we value commitment. I certainly agree, therefore, with the intentions behind the new clause.

Although the Government support the principle behind the new clause, now is not the appropriate time to bring forward such a measure. It would entail significant and immediate costs to the Exchequer, its scope is wider than the Conservative party manifesto pledge and the cost, we estimate, would be more than £4 billion. It would also necessitate substantial implementation costs.

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I repeat: why is politics held in such contempt? It is because politicians go to the people at general elections and promise things—

[Ian Austin]

rose—

[Mr Leigh]

I am not going to give way, because the House wants to come to a decision on this.

The House is held in such contempt because we make pledges and then we do not carry them out. We made a solemn pledge before the election, and we repeated it after the election—

[Ian Austin]

Nonsense!

[Mr Leigh]

I will not be shouted down by the hon. Gentleman. He was not here for most of the debate anyway.

We made that pledge, and we should now respect it. I was hoping to be able to say that the new clause was defective, and that we would be quite happy to withdraw it and to redraft it to enable civil partnerships to be recognised. We would be quite happy if the Minister then said that it could be introduced during the course of this Parliament. However, he has not said that. I am afraid that he has not answered the points that we have put to him. We had an hour’s speech by the hon. Member for North Durham (Mr Jones), most of which did not address what we are trying to say. I want to end by saying that none of us is trying to penalise two-earner families or single parents. We are simply trying to remove the severe penalty that this country imposes on one-earner families. The United Kingdom is completely out of step with most of the world in that regard. Nothing in our proposal is radical; it is sensible and it is right, and I think that we should now have a Division on it.

Question put, That the clause be read a Second time.

The House proceeded to a Division.