Autumn Statement

Debate between Luciana Berger and George Osborne

Wednesday 3rd December 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

My hon. Friend has been a real champion for small businesses and for exporters in her Stourbridge constituency, and for attracting investment into the black country. I pay tribute to the work she has done. The measures we have taken today to help high street stores by increasing the business rate discount to £1,500, to take the smallest businesses out of business rates, and to back exporters and to increase the research and development tax credit for firms in the west midlands are all tribute to the work she has done and the issues she has raised in Parliament.

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Chancellor presented things as being very rosy, but a survey that came out today says that 72% of the British public feel no sense of recovery whatsoever. Why is he so out of touch?

[Mr Osborne]

In the hon. Lady’s own constituency, unemployment is down. In her own constituency, economic security has increased as people can see that the country is not in the crisis it was in four or five years ago. She has to ask her constituents this: do they want to return to the economic instability and crisis that everyone remembers under the previous Labour Government, or do they want to stay on course to prosperity? I think the British public will conclude that they want to stay on course to prosperity.

EU Budget (Surcharge)

Debate between Luciana Berger and George Osborne

Monday 10th November 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

The first and kindest cut of all was closing down the euro preparations unit, which I discovered in the Treasury on coming to office.

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

I know that the Chancellor did not want to answer the question from my hon. Friend the Member for Motherwell and Wishaw (Mr Roy), but I will try again. Can he please name one EU Finance Minister who supports his version of events?

[Mr Osborne]

All 28 countries, and therefore 27 other Finance Ministers, agreed to our plan, and the plan put forward by other member states, to change the rules so that we do not have to pay on 1 December, to enable us to delay payment, to ensure that no interest will be paid during that delay, to ensure that any errors in the accounts will be rectified and that we will be compensated for them next year, and to ensure that this never happens again. We got that coalition of support around the table. The discussions on the rebate, as I am sure the hon. Lady knows, happen between the UK and the European Commission.

Autumn Statement

Debate between Luciana Berger and George Osborne

Thursday 5th December 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

My hon. Friend led an effective and powerful campaign on behalf of his constituents and other former miners who had lost their concessionary fuel allowance because of the collapse of the company they had worked for. I stepped in to help because he and others, including my hon. Friends the Members for Sherwood (Mr Spencer), for Nuneaton (Mr Jones) and for North Warwickshire (Dan Byles), came to talk to me about the matter. It was a simple case of doing the right thing and, thanks to my hon. Friend, we have done it.

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

Will the Chancellor confirm press reports this morning that his free school meal announcement has resulted in an £80 million raid on the school building budget of the Department for Education?

[Mr Osborne]

No, the £80 million is additional.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Luciana Berger and George Osborne

Tuesday 5th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

I certainly agree that we need to reform the European Union so that our entire continent is not priced out of the global economy. We must also make reforms to the European Union, and Britain’s relationship with it, so that British businesses can thrive, compete and create jobs. I point out to my hon. Friend—he knows this anyway—that the cost of the European Union would have been much higher if my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister had not secured a very good deal. [Interruption.] The right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood (Ed Balls) says, “We did it,” but Labour gave up the rebate. The Prime Minister went to the EU battling for Britain and delivered for Britain.

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

Over the past six months more than 350,000 people, many of them in work, have accessed emergency food aid from a food bank. When will the Chancellor visit a food bank so that he can see for himself the impact of his cost-of-living crisis on hundreds of thousands of people across the country?

[Mr Osborne]

I have visited a food bank in Northwich in my constituency and seen the excellent work it does. I commend the volunteers at that food bank, and indeed across the whole food bank movement.

Spending Review

Debate between Luciana Berger and George Osborne

Wednesday 26th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

We did win the battle of Waterloo with that Army, so we were not doing that badly. We are trying to make the choice to have a modern, deployable Army, fully equipped with the latest technology. To address the hon. Gentleman’s specific points, no reduction is required to the uniformed services. I would assume that that would include military bands, but that is for the Defence Secretary to set out. On housing, the Defence Secretary has set out a multi-billion pound plan to improve the housing stock for our brave soldiers and their families.

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

Half a million people in our country accessed emergency food aid in the past year. The main reason people give for having to go to a food bank is delays in receiving the support to which they are entitled, whether they are in or out of work. How does the Chancellor believe that that situation will improve as a result of the announcements he has made today?

[Mr Osborne]

Food bank use went up tenfold under the previous Labour Government. We have advertised the services of food banks, which are great local community projects, through the jobcentres. I know that I am not allowed to ask questions, so let me pose a rhetorical question. Labour Members complain about the use of food banks, but can they explain why their use went up tenfold under the previous Government?

Economic Policy

Debate between Luciana Berger and George Osborne

Monday 25th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

My hon. Friend is right. The UK had the highest structural deficit of the G7 going into the financial crisis. That was confirmed by the IMF just before Christmas. He is also right about our trade patterns. When this Government came to office we were exporting more to Ireland than to the BRIC countries—Brazil, Russia, India and China—combined. We are seeking to expand our trade with those countries and it has been going up markedly. I think there has been an almost 100% increase in our trade with China and, of course, the Prime Minister led a high-powered business delegation to India only last week.

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

Will the Chancellor remind the House and the country how many billions of pounds his Government have borrowed since he came to office?

[Mr Osborne]

We borrow money because we are running a deficit and we are trying to get it down from the 11.5% that we inherited. The deficit has actually come down by a quarter over the past couple of years.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Luciana Berger and George Osborne

Tuesday 11th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

My hon. Friend has that reassurance. We have discovered an extraordinary thing today, namely that Labour will vote against yet another measure to deal with the deficit. Labour would have a higher benefits bill as a result of that decision and it will have to explain that to the hard-working people of this country.

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

I listened carefully to the Chancellor’s answer to the question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Linlithgow and East Falkirk (Michael Connarty) about food poverty, but he did not actually answer it. Is he ashamed that, under his watch, by the end of this year a quarter of a million people across the country will have accessed emergency food aid?

[Mr Osborne]

We are dealing with the economic mess that the previous Government left behind, when unemployment rose, the economy shrank by 6% and people were put into poverty. That is the cause of these problems and Government Members are dealing with them and clearing up the mess that that man—the right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood (Ed Balls)—left behind.

Autumn Statement

Debate between Luciana Berger and George Osborne

Wednesday 5th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

We do not intend to disrupt existing PFI schemes—although, sadly, there are not many left, because so many dried up at the very end of the last Labour Government’s time in office owing to financing problems—and the new PFI 2 will help to restart private and public investment. The big difference is that from now on, instead of the public sector bearing the risk and getting none of the reward—as has happened, for example, in the case of a hospital project not in my hon. Friend’s part of London but in south-east London—it will share in the upside as well.

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

Can the Chancellor confirm that the capital spending that he has announced for free schools amounts to less than a third of the cuts in the capital budgets for schools and colleges?

[Mr Osborne]

Capital spending is higher than the level in the plans that we inherited from the last Labour Government. That is simply the case. We inherited big planned cuts in capital spending, and we have increased capital spending, off those plans. We have that new money for schools, and I would hope that the hon. Lady would welcome that.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Luciana Berger and George Osborne

Tuesday 1st November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

T8. What does the Chancellor say to the Federation of Small Businesses, which describes his policies as too timid, and out of touch with the sluggishness of the UK’s economy?

[Mr Osborne]

The FSB, like many other business organisations, has supported what we have done to try to get the deficit down—and of course it also welcomes the fact that not only did we reverse the increase that the Labour Government planned in the small companies rate, but we have also been able to reduce the small companies rate and freeze business rates for another year.

Eurozone Crisis

Debate between Luciana Berger and George Osborne

Thursday 27th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

Yes, I think that there are plenty of things that Greece can do, which the Greek Government have already identified, to make itself much more competitive. It is coming from a long way behind, but it can do quite a lot in regard to its labour market, its pension ages, its tax rates and the like that would make it considerably more competitive than it is today.

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

Can the Chancellor please give us more details of how he intends to represent the UK’s interests, given that the eurozone countries have their own separate president and summits?

[Mr Osborne]

Eurozone Finance Ministers’ meetings are already held every month—that was agreed by the previous Government—and there is now an agreement to hold two eurozone Heads of Government summits a year. There have been two this year already, but we should not regard that as a fundamental threat; we have to allow them to get together to better manage their own currency. We are, however, looking at proposals that have been put forward here for those summits to take place after the EU27 leaders gather, rather than before, so that we do not have any caucusing in advance of a meeting of the European Council.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Luciana Berger and George Osborne

Tuesday 22nd March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

I think my hon. Friend is getting a little ahead of himself. The commitment is to a real-terms increase in the personal tax allowance in each and every year. People will have to wait for the Budget tomorrow. The increase of £1,000 in the personal tax allowance has taken 900,000 people of out of tax.

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

T4. Writing in The Independent at the end of 2009, the then shadow Chancellor said:“If I become Chancellor, the Treasury will become a green ally, not a foe.”Will that pledge be reflected in tomorrow’s Budget?

[Mr Osborne]

Yes, it will.

Bank Bonuses

Debate between Luciana Berger and George Osborne

Tuesday 11th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

Absolutely. What we want is the maximum sustainable tax revenue—that is the objective of this Government—and, indeed, to get the maximum sustainable lending into the British economy. We are trying to link the two in a settlement. I have no idea what the Labour party is proposing, but this is the sensible way forward.

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

May I give the Chancellor another opportunity to answer the question? When are we going to see the detailed proposals for robust action, as promised on page 9 of the coalition agreement, specifically to target—bankers’ bonuses?

[Mr Osborne]

“It says here.”

What I would say is that we have introduced the code of practice, which extends the coverage of the code to 2,500 firms rather than 25. We are taking that action, and as I have said, we are also seeking a lower bonus pool than existed when the party that the hon. Lady supports was in government last year. That is a sensible step forward in the current climate.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Luciana Berger and George Osborne

Tuesday 12th October 2010 Commons Chamber

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

T4. Many pensioners in my constituency are concerned about the indexation of pensions changing from the retail prices index to the consumer prices index. A pensioner who currently receives a pension of £10,000 will be more than £800 worse off by 2016. Does the Minister think that it is fair for pensioners to be hit in that way?

[Mr Osborne]

The Government have introduced a triple lock on the basic state pension, which means that it rises by earnings, or by CPI or RPI—whichever is higher. The previous Government had 13 years to do that, and they did not.