Budget Statement

Lord Bishop of Portsmouth Excerpts

Friday 12th March 2021 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Bishop of Portsmouth [V]]

My Lords, I welcome from the Bishops’ Bench the noble Lords, Lord Beynon, Lord Cruddas and Lord Khan of Burnley, and congratulate them on their speeches. I am looking forward to hearing them. I also welcome the noble Lord, Lord Bellingham, and my namesake, the noble Baroness, Lady Foster of Oxton.

Every Budget has consequences in every community, including those I serve as Bishop of Portsmouth. In these last comments that I shall make on a Budget Statement, I have four points on how this Budget is likely to make the sharp end sharper still for many, with little slack, even in better times. A decade on from the Dilnot report, there is still no proposal to address the social care challenge, even though apparently the Government have a package ready. We should have bitten this bullet years ago. We must bite it now.

Freezing income tax thresholds will level not up but down for many, squeezing household budgets, especially in the interaction with benefits, for those already squeezed. The extended uplift in universal credit offers some welcome respite for those at the sharp end, but it will be cold comfort to those facing a cliff edge as the nights draw in. Not a single word was uttered on meeting the needs of children, as Mark Russell, chief executive of the Children’s Society, pointed out. It is a startling omission.

I do not envy the choices facing the Chancellor. I applaud his attempts to improve the macroeconomic situation, but I am far from convinced that this Budget meets his objective of protecting those most in need.