Property Taxes
Debate between Mel Stride and Jim Shannon(2 weeks, 2 days ago)
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Sir Mel Stride
My right hon. Friend, as ever, is absolutely right. The reality, as we see in the bond yields at the moment, is that the markets have no confidence in the ability of this Government to get on top of spending. We saw the farce of a Government who came into office scrapping the £5 billion of welfare savings that were already baked into the OBR’s scorecard because we had brought them in, and attempting to bring forward their own reforms only for their Back Benchers to vote them down. My right hon. Friend is so right; this Government do not have the will or the plan to deal with spending, and that is at the heart of the reason why we will all be punished and pay the price of more taxes come the Budget in November.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I commend the shadow Chancellor for bringing forward this subject for debate. He clearly shares my deep concern that I have, and that I think everyone in this Chamber should have, that the Government are considering a further tax on property, despite the fact that the Prime Minister committed to not imposing capital gains tax on residents of this United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Last year, it was the family inheritance tax; this year, those who own property—those who have scrimped and saved for their house, those who are middle class, those hard workers—have now become the latest target of Labour tax policy.
Sir Mel Stride
The hon. Gentleman is entirely right. Of course, if the Government have got into a situation where they are having to scrabble around and look at property taxes, as we are debating this afternoon, than really nothing is safe from the taxman under this Government.
Social Security
Debate between Mel Stride and Jim Shannon(1 year ago)
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Mel Stride
The hon. Gentleman is entirely wrong. We went into the election promising the triple lock plus. Unlike his party, under which millions of pensioners are going to be dragged into income tax spend, many of them for the first time, we were prepared to stand up and say that we would not do that.
Jim Shannon
I commend the right hon. Gentleman and his party for bringing forward this issue, which is massive for my constituents and those across the whole United Kingdom. I say this with respect to the Labour party: this policy does not conform to any Labour party policies that I have seen in the past. Pensioners who have contacted me say that they are concerned because the threshold is too low, because pension credit will take nine weeks to process even if it gets to the 28% who are eligible in Northern Ireland, and because the £400 that the Labour Government have approved will not come until spring next year. Those are three reasons why the motion has to be supported.
Mel Stride
The hon. Gentleman is entirely right, as always, and I completely agree with every word that he has just said.
We are the party of the triple lock, and we were the party of the triple lock plus. We are the party that has raised the state pension by £3,700 since 2010, and we are the party that has seen 200,000 fewer pensioners in absolute poverty since we came to office. That is now going to go into reverse.
I will now, rather more gently and rather more quietly, make an impassioned plea to Government Members: look to your conscience. You know in your hearts that these measures are wrong, that the Labour party has broken its promises, and that these measures will lead to untold hardship for millions of elderly and vulnerable people right up and down the country. You now have an opportunity to join with us and put a stop to it.