HMRC Impact Analysis: Customs

Matt Rodda Excerpts

Tuesday 8th October 2019 Commons Chamber

[Jesse Norman]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right that any job losses are deeply regrettable, and I am sure she will be delighted that, in aggregate, this country has proven to be astonishingly adept at creating good new jobs over the past 10 years. With this impact assessment, I think I am right in saying that the detail is not available that allows for a constituency-by-constituency or even regional assessment, which is why it has been done in aggregate, based on the number of declarations that are expected and the cost per declaration. Of course, it may be possible for other entities to take the number of businesses that were expected to fill out declarations and produce impact assessments for the specific areas that they are concerned about.

[Matt Rodda (Reading East) (Lab)]

It is quite clear from the Minister’s answers that the Government are willing to place enormous additional burdens on business. Given everything that he has written and said in the past, how can he possibly justify that approach?

[Jesse Norman]

I gently remind the hon. Gentleman that the burdens that he claims will be placed by this can not only be mitigated by voting for a deal but will be as nothing compared with the burdens that will be imposed on the UK economy by a Labour Government dedicated to nationalising, without full compensation, a swathe of industries and expropriating a large number of people by transferring property into the hands of employees. I think those things will impose much greater costs on the economy than anything that has been contemplated today.