Corporate Profits: Inflation

Lord Robathan Excerpts

Thursday 29th June 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Robathan (Con)]

My Lords, does my noble friend the Minister not agree that the problem has been caused by the money supply increase, quantitative easing over the years and, in particular, most recently, the coronavirus nonsense, when lockdowns cost this country billions and contributed to the parlous state of the economy and inflation? Noble Lords on the other side are complaining now, yet in the past they wanted even further restrictions which would have cost this country money and, indeed, contributed to inflation.

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My noble friend is right that we are still feeling the effects of the Covid pandemic in a number of ways. This Government put in place unprecedented economic support to get people and families through that pandemic, and we have had to take difficult decisions about the public finances since. Another way in which we are still feeling the effects of the pandemic is in the unwinding of the measures put in place to control it. We have seen heightened pressure on global supply chains; that has been part of the driver of the increased inflation and higher prices that we are seeing.