Amendment of the Law

Marcus Jones Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Diana Johnson]

I meant no disrespect to you, Mr Deputy Speaker. Of course, I did not mean that.

Let me bring my remarks to a conclusion.

[Mr Marcus Jones (Nuneaton) (Con)]

The hon. Lady said that employers did not seem to want to take up the offer of apprenticeships. She is entirely wrong. The Government’s current scheme, which will generate a further 40,000 apprenticeships over the next couple of years, is over-subscribed. How can she square that with what she said?

[Diana Johnson]

With respect to the hon. Gentleman, that is not what I said. Employers in Hull tell me that the opportunities available to their businesses are limited because growth is so restricted, and that they therefore cannot take on apprentices. Meanwhile, providers tell me that they bring young people into the training centres, but then cannot find the apprenticeship places that would enable them to do their training.

There have been a good many academic debates today about what the Budget means—about bond markets and so forth—but in practical terms, for our constituents up and down the country, the real issues are connected with the cost of living. The rate of inflation in this country is now the highest in western Europe, people are worried about whether they will have jobs in the coming months, and there are problems with fuel duty. I am glad that the Government have been able to reduce fuel duty by 1p, but I find it rather ironic that the Conservatives are not able to challenge the European Union on VAT and derogation. Surely this is an opportunity for a party that is for ever wanting to take pot shots at the EU to do something constructive.

I believe that the deep cuts that are being made now will lead to social costs in the long term. It is dreadful that the coalition Government are targeting their cuts at communities in some of the most deprived areas, and at the most deprived and vulnerable groups in those communities. For instance, Hull city council’s early years service is being scrapped. We shall have no officers, no support for our nurseries, and no support for children in nurseries who have special educational needs, because the early intervention grant that the Government said would cover the cost of children’s centres and support for children under five does not do what it says on the tin. We shall end up with buildings that are open, with caretakers and receptionists, but with no children in them.

As I have said, the coalition Government’s cuts will store up a great many problems for the future. They utter plenty of fine words about the need for early intervention and support for families and communities, but they do not deliver the finance.

The Government strike me as a group of deficit deceivers and growth deniers who are making our country a less fair and secure place in which to live. Until 2008, the spending commitments of the right hon. Member for Tatton (Mr Osborne) matched those of the Labour Government across the board. Only when the banking crisis arrived did the then Opposition take a different approach. The Liberal Democrat council in Hull took the view that the Labour Government should be spending far more on Hull, but now Kingston upon Hull council is losing 9% of its budget, while Kingston upon Thames is losing 3%. That is not fair. The Chancellor may stand up and talk about a fair Budget, but this is not a fair Budget; neither is it a Budget for growth.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Marcus Jones (Nuneaton) (Con)]

I will be a Jones who shows some brevity out of courtesy for his colleagues on both sides of the House.

I welcome the Chancellor’s Budget and congratulate him on it, because this is a difficult time to be a Chancellor and to deliver a Budget, as it will be for the rest of this Parliament. As much as Opposition Members like to deny it, the Chancellor is constrained by the straitjacket of the deficit and the debt left behind by Labour. We must view the Budget in context. We are paying £120 million a day in interest alone on our debt—£43 billion this year, which is more than we spend on the armed forces, the Foreign Office and the Department for International Development combined—which is a scandal.

I therefore commend the Chancellor for what is, in the circumstances, a first-rate Budget. It goes some way to recognising the financial pain that is being felt in the country, and serves to set a clear tone for the business community. This Government take businesses far more seriously. They recognise that people and businesses and not the state create jobs—sustainable jobs—and that if we are not serious about business, the country cannot sustain in a settled fashion the important public services on which we all rely.

There are positives in the Budget for individuals and businesses, but I shall also respectfully mention one or two concerns about it. I welcome the announcement on fuel, which is currently the biggest issue for my constituents. People will tonight breathe a sigh of relief that the 5p a litre increase programmed into the Budget by the previous Chancellor, the right hon. Member for Edinburgh South West (Mr Darling), has been deferred. I am delighted that that has happened. People will also breathe a sigh of relief that the Government recognised the importance of that, and decided to get off the escalator at the right time, unlike the previous Government, who did not know when to get off, as we saw in 2000 when our fuel depots were blockaded by truckers and angry motorists, which I hope will not happen now.

[Mr David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Jones]

I am not giving way, I am afraid, because certain Members have taken far too long in the debate, thereby stifling others.

I am delighted that the personal tax allowance has been increased to more than £8,000 this coming year. It is vital that we free people from the shackles of tax, particularly those on lower incomes. It is excellent that 1.1 million people will be lifted out of income tax altogether—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green) does not understand. The previous Government shackled people to income tax. They increased the minimum wage way above inflation year on year, but they did not increase the personal allowance, which meant that more and more people were sucked into income tax.

[Kate Green]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Jones]

No. I am not giving way to the hon. Lady.

Moving on, I welcome the help that we are giving first-time buyers, although I would ask those on the Front Bench to consider a couple of issues. Can we build the properties that we need to sustain the scheme quickly enough? Would it be better to extend the scheme to older properties, as well as new-build properties? First-time buyers are the lifeblood of the property market and of any chain. I acknowledge that the policy will do a lot of good for the building industry, but we also need to put in place measures to ensure that the property market can sustain itself. Currently it is under intense pressure. Expanding the policy to cover the property market as a whole will do a lot of good and improve the situation for the industries that rely on it.

I make a plea for the Chancellor to look at stamp duty land tax in his next couple of Budgets, because it is quite punitive in terms of the slab rate, particularly up at the £250,000 threshold. Over this Parliament, if not during the next one, we need to look at putting in place changes to stamp duty land tax that result in more marginal rates, just as we have different levels of income tax.

I also make a plea for anything that is done in the property market to be implemented as quickly as is practically possible. Back in 2008, the Labour Government introduced a stamp duty holiday, but if I recall rightly, they suggested in the press that they were doing so about six or eight weeks before it was actually implemented. That had a dramatic and devastating effect on the property market and those involved in it during that interim period. Therefore, we need to ensure that we are expeditious in implementing policies.

This has been a great Budget for business, within the constraints that the Government face. I would like to mention fuel again. Many small and medium-sized hauliers in my constituency are struggling to cope with increases in the price of fuel. In the main, they have to pay for fuel at the pump, but they are not paid by those for whom they work for 60 to 90 days. I am sure that they will welcome the Chancellor’s announcement today.

Regulation is one of the biggest banes of business, particularly small and medium-sized businesses, and costs them £80 billion a year, so they will welcome a reduction in red tape and regulation. They will also welcome the fact that the Prime Minister is looking to reduce regulation in the European Union to make it more competitive as a whole, which is vital. I hope that Government Members will continue to press the Chancellor and the Prime Minister to ensure that those plans bear fruit, because they are important to freeing up our businesses and allowing them to expand and employ more people.

I want to mention the beer and pub industry. I am slightly disappointed that in today’s Budget we have not sought to do anything about the beer duty escalator introduced by the previous Government. Since 2008, beer duty has increased by 26%. Unfortunately, we have not looked to soften that blow today. However, I hope that those on the Front Bench will listen to what I am saying and look to soften the blow for both the brewing industry and the pub industry. We have hundreds of thousands of pubs closing every year. Our great British pub is under pressure, and we should look to support it. I hope those on the Front Bench will take that on board.

Finally, I want to mention the advances that we are making on skills, which are vital to ensuring that our work force can sustain the jobs that we will hopefully help to create in the economy with the additional measures that the Chancellor has mentioned this afternoon. It is fantastic that we will have another 250,000 apprenticeships over the next four years. I am heartened by that, because young people have for so long been cast adrift, and this will help to bring them into employment and training in a sustainable way, and also in a way that will perhaps enable them to garner the knowledge to create their own businesses one day and employ others, which is what we have seen over many years.

I welcome the university training colleges, and I am sure that the large industrial companies in the west midlands will welcome that approach. I hope that it will help people to acquire the skills to fill what those companies are describing at the moment as a void. Companies such as Jaguar Land Rover want to expand greatly, and they need a supply of skills to sustain any such expansion. They need skills from local people in the west midlands. We do not want to bring in people from other countries to fill that void.

Given the constraints that the Government are having to work under—it was far from a golden legacy that we inherited from Labour—this is a positive Budget with good intentions for business and for creating jobs with substance. It also contains measures to bring back to this country the prosperity that has been badly needed for many years.