Income Tax (Charge)

Luke Taylor Excerpts

Tuesday 5th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Tim Roca (Macclesfield) (Lab)]

The first Labour Budget in 14 years needs us to take a clear-eyed view of what has been inherited. Looking at the Conservative legacy for our country, we see: terrible, almost non-existent, average earnings growth; lower productivity per worker hour than in every G7 country besides Italy; GDP per capita growth stalling for the longest time since the end of the war; record debt; high taxes; and poor public services. The lack of growth in real wages is unprecedented in the last 200 years of British economic history. That is the Conservatives’ record, and that is what they have to face up to.

Particularly savage, as hon. Members have pointed out, were the cuts to public investment. The Conservative Government inherited a debt-to-GDP ratio in 2010 of 65%. Ten years later, pre-covid, it was 83%. The Conservative Government promised to eliminate the deficit in 2010; then they promised to eliminate it in the 2015 and 2017 elections; and then they gave up the ghost entirely in the 2019 election. After that dazzling record, we were treated to the Liz Truss magic—Liz, a prophet currently not recognised in her own land. She presented a mini-Budget with £45 billion of unfunded tax cuts. There were no forecasts—the Conservatives like the Office for Budget Responsibility today, but they did not like OBR then—and we know what happened. We saw Tory chaos, and we can never go back to that.

When my right hon. Friend came to office as Chancellor of the Exchequer and looked under the hood, what did she find? More chaos: unfunded policy decisions; undisclosed pressures; and overspends. The OBR listed them. The previous Government promised but did not allocate a penny for the £10 billion infected blood compensation scheme. They promised but did not budget for the £2 billion Horizon Post Office scandal. I am glad to see stability and common sense finally return. There are fiscal rules that make sense and will be adhered to; we are bringing the current budget into balance, so that we do not borrow to fund day-to-day spending; and we are moving to a proper recognition of net financial debt that takes into account investment that delivers. Those sound, sensible decisions put us on a sustainable path. Compare that to a Conservative party that would rather we continued

“to founder under old habits, rotting institutions,”

and that is content for Britain’s hull to be “encrusted with nostalgia”, and for us to drift off into the 21st century.

[Luke Taylor (Sutton and Cheam) (LD)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Tim Roca]

I will not; I have only 25 seconds left. That is the story of national decline that the Conservative party was writing for our country. We will not stand for it. We are going to build a better, greener, fairer future for our country.

--- Later in debate ---

[Luke Taylor (Sutton and Cheam) (LD)]

Members of this House will have seen that the celebrated Scottish comedian Janey Godley passed away on Saturday, after her long struggle with cancer came to an end in the Prince and Princess of Wales hospice in Glasgow. In her final days, Janey used social media to highlight the wonderful hospice care she received, and when her daughter announced her death, she took time to mention that her mother’s passing was

“peaceful and a nice transition.”

That is the profound value of hospice care to our society and the nation’s families.

Janey Godley’s choice to highlight the care she was receiving in her final days should remind us all why hospices matter, yet across the country it is not an exaggeration to say that hospices are at breaking point, as we have heard from Members across the House this afternoon. Many hospices are grappling with severe staff shortages and tight budget constraints. Redundancies and supply shortages have become alarmingly common, highlighting systemic issues in the hospice sector. This most vital of services is reliant on an unsustainable model which, on average, requires two thirds of hospice funding to come from some sort of charitable donation. That leaves hospices vulnerable, reliant on charity shops and large contributions with no guarantee of financial stability, and it also adds to the postcode lottery for patients. Even the NHS funding that hospices receive fails to keep pace with inflation.

Nowhere is that crisis more evident than at St Raphael’s hospice in my constituency of Sutton and Cheam. St Raph’s is more than just a healthcare facility; it is a sanctuary for those seeking to die with dignity. The compassionate care provided there not only supports the dying, but brings comfort to their families in one of the most challenging times in their lives. However, it receives only 25% of its funding from the NHS, which is substantially below the national average. In recent months, the hospice has been forced to reduce its clinical community nurse team by 20% and has completely discontinued its hospice at home programme, which once made sure that patients who wanted to spend their final days in the comfort of their own home could do so with dignity and support.

Over the past four years, running costs for St Raph’s have risen by more than a million pounds, but NHS funding to the hospice has increased by only £140,000. In last week’s Budget, the Chancellor pledged £22.6 billion to the NHS, which is long overdue after years of Conservative neglect. However, hospices were notably absent from Labour’s 10-year plan for the NHS, and the rise in employer NI contributions threatens to push hospices already struggling with fragile finances over the cliff edge.

If this Government are serious about delivering change, they will exempt hospices from the rise in NI contributions and listen to calls from the sector and inside this very House to sort out a proper funding deal to rescue our hospices.