Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation

Matt Western Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab) [V]]

It is a year ago that we sat in a packed Chamber to hear the Chancellor claim that he was

“releasing the counter-cyclical buffer”.—[Official Report, 11 March 2020; Vol. 673, c. 279.]

I have to say that at the time, I thought it was something to do with letting his neighbour out of his fridge, but in fact, none of us is still any the wiser. More seriously, by that day the Prime Minister had already chosen to miss the first five Cobra briefings on the epidemic. He had indeed gone AWOL. That was a time when we should have been hearing the drumbeat of a Government prepared to face the threat. Instead, we heard:

“We will protect our country and our people.”—[Official Report, 11 March 2020; Vol. 673, c. 278.]

Except they did not: 123,000 deaths and counting, an economy that has crashed, falling 10% last year, and the Government presiding over the worst death rate of all the major nations. They got it wrong. Now we face the worst economic damage of all large economies, the consequences of which will be suffered for decades to come. They got it wrong.

Having sat and listened to the Chancellor’s speech, I find it extraordinary that he did not once mention the need for greater investment in our health service. Nor did he choose to acknowledge the work of all those on the frontline, including social care workers, and repay them for their courage and professionalism. Sadly, he has chosen not to respect their efforts. One thing we have learned from the past year is that the Government do well to listen to the Opposition—for example, the suggestion to introduce a furlough scheme. I welcome the Government’s announcement that they will be extending that scheme for a further six months, but they should have done this from day one, as happened in Germany, where the scheme will run until early 2022.

The truth is that the Chancellor’s announcements today do little to address the foundations of our economy. Those foundations have been undermined by the austerity of the past 10 years, but this relates not only to our economy but to our social fabric and the increasing inequality laid bare by the pandemic. But not once did the Chancellor mention inequality. We can measure a Government by their priorities. The Chancellor talked up his freeports, but it all sounded a bit emperor’s new clothes. This is a Government who are continuing with HS2 despite the fundamental restructuring of our economy that is going on, yet they are unable to recognise that a council house building programme is desperately needed. When it comes to our businesses, all that their leaders wanted to hear was some certainty for a country that has been bedevilled by the policies of successive Conservative Governments resulting in a steep decline in business investment. The Chancellor has got it wrong.

Where is the vision and delivery of public-private investment? Where are the plans for the network of electric vehicle charging points and hydrogen infrastructure that we need if we are to deliver net zero? It is not enough to leave it to those in the private sector, as they themselves state. Finally, it is not enough to continue with the business rates holiday. The Chancellor failed to do the right thing and undertake the wholesale revision needed to address the massive distortion in our economic landscape. The evidence is damning. The OBR has underlined the fact that we have sustained the worst economic damage of any G7 country, and it will be the public who pay for the Chancellor’s mistakes. A word of advice, then, for the Chancellor: he needs to start acting in the national interest and not in his own self-interest, or the public will never forgive him. Once again, he has got it wrong.