Budget Statement

Lord Triesman Excerpts

Friday 12th March 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Triesman (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, my noble friend Lord Eatwell has precisely described this Budget’s overall strategy as an overbearing commitment to “outdated fiscal orthodoxy”. The Budget fails to stimulate seed-corn innovation in green technologies, repair the social and welfare damage that has been done, or deal with the wealth divisions. Nor does it help children, who are not mentioned, or mitigate inevitable unemployment, which is on the horizon.

The 1% proposal for NHS staff is a grave error; 2.5% was awarded last summer for the police and this was rightly justified by the Government, not least for the extra Covid duties that they undertook. NHS staff cannot be treated worse. The hundreds of thousands of self-employed and people in micro-businesses, who have not been reached by any help, have also not been helped in this Budget. All are critical matters of resilience for the country and all show that we need a more durable form of social justice.

Finally, it remains wholly unclear how the UK and the EU will co-operate in the financial sector. It is of global importance to us and the review by the noble Lord, Lord Hill, again emphasises this. London’s global leadership is not safe. Amsterdam has overtaken us as an active trade hub, and the Budget has almost nothing to say on trade. The massive, mission-critical gap opening up is of great seriousness. It is no basis for reliable business planning and does not speak to continuity or certainty. This is not special pleading for the financial sector; it is about jobs and long-term prosperity, about green growth and fairer build-back, not a plea to feather nests. The role of the state has grown significantly in the last year and it is inevitable that the Government have to be the weather maker.