Confidence in Her Majesty’s Government

Michael Fabricant Excerpts

Monday 18th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I will not give way; I am going to make some progress.

We took back control of our money, we took back control of our borders and we installed a points-based system for immigration. We took back control of our laws. We on this side of the House took back the sovereign right of the British people to determine their own laws and their own future in Parliament, and for that I say to colleagues on the Government Benches: your place in history is secure. I say to the Leader of the Opposition: it will never be forgotten that 48 times he tried to overturn the will of the people—48 times he tried to strike down the biggest expression of popular will. It will be remembered in the history of this country. Be in no doubt that if he were ever to come to power with his hopeless coalition of Liberal Democrats and Scottish nationalists, he would try to do so again, at the drop of a hat.

It was only a month or so later that the Government were forced to show their resolve again, when we began to lose thousands of lives in the worst pandemic for a century; a global pandemic whose origins we did not fully understand and were nothing to do with the British people—if anything, they were the result of distant misbehaviour involving bats or pangolins—and whose spread was appallingly difficult to manage. Through wave after wave, this Government never gave up, and thanks to the courage and indomitable resilience of the British people, we protected our NHS and saved thousands of lives.

We were finally rescued by the genius of British scientists, by a vaccine that was licensed faster than any vaccine in the world and by a roll-out that was faster than that of any comparable country—faster, of course, than we would have achieved if we had listened to the Leader of the Opposition. It was so fast that the EU Commission actually tried to expropriate 5 million doses of Astra to try to slow us down, it can be told —[Interruption.] Yes, “shame” is right. And still they failed. In so far as the Opposition came up with any ideas at all, they quaveringly called for more lockdowns. We trusted to British science and the vaccine roll-out. They vacillated, we vaccinated, and we vaccinated so fast that we came out of lockdown quicker than any other European country. When I look at that achievement, Mr Speaker, I tell you I have confidence in this Government and in what they can do.

As a direct result of the actions of the Government, we had the fastest growth in the G7 last year, which is why we are able now to help people across the country with the latest challenge: the global inflation in energy prices triggered partly by post-covid blockages but made far worse by Putin’s vile war in Ukraine. It is because we have sensibly managed the economy that we have the fiscal firepower to give £1,200 to the 8 million most vulnerable households and £400 to help every household with the cost of energy. We can do that because our economic fundamentals are strong, with British companies hiring talent up and down the country, with unemployment at or near a 50-year low, with 620,000 more people in payroll employment than there were before the pandemic began and youth unemployment at or near a 45-year low, and with people coming off benefits and getting into work, including 500,000 just in the six months to June.

That is the fundamental difference between this Government and the Opposition: we believe that the best answer to poverty is not benefits—that is what they think—but the security, happiness and dignity that goes with a job. I am proud of what we have done throughout the last three years to champion working people: lifting the living wage, cutting tax for those on universal credit, and just in the last couple of weeks, the biggest tax cut in 10 years for the vast majority of people on lower incomes who pay national insurance contributions.

I will give you a fact, Mr Speaker. That is why today, under this Government, the poorer households in this country get more of their income from their earnings, and under Labour they got more of their income from benefits. That is the reality of the difference between them and us. There has never been a Labour Government that left office with unemployment lower than when it came in. That is why I have confidence in Her Majesty’s Government.

[Michael Fabricant (Lichfield) (Con)]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for giving way. I personally think that our party is making the same mistake the Labour party made when it knifed Tony Blair. Is my right hon. Friend aware that the excess death rates in Europe show that, thanks to his early intervention with the vaccine, fewer people died in the United Kingdom than in the majority of other European countries? And thanks to his intervention, Kyiv is still a part of Ukraine and not a part of Russia.

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my hon. Friend very much. He is absolutely right in what he says about the record of the NHS and the record of this country in beating back covid. What a pity it was that the right hon. and learned Gentleman, the Leader of the Opposition, came so many times to this place and said that we had the worst record in Europe. He has never taken it back, Mr Speaker. Perhaps he will do so in the course of the debate to come.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Deputy Prime Minister (Dominic Raab)]

I rise to proudly defend the record of this Government under this Prime Minister, and to speak in favour of the motion before the House. The Government under this Prime Minister have steered the country through some of the most difficult challenges in living memory.

This Government under this Prime Minister got the big calls right on the vaccine roll-out—the fastest and most effective in Europe. We would not have been able to do that if we had listened to the right hon. and learned Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer), the Leader of the Opposition, because we would have been tied to the EU’s approach, with all of its limitations. [Interruption.] Labour Members chunter from a sedentary position, but it is worth reflecting on how many lives and livelihoods it would have cost us if we had listened to the right hon. and learned Gentleman. Labour Members really ought to have a bit more contrition.

Next, the Prime Minister and this Government took the tough call to come out of lockdown. It was around this time last year and in the teeth of opposition from the right hon. and learned Gentleman, backed up by his colleagues. As a result, we emerged with the fastest growing economy in the G7 last year, with 12 million jobs saved by furlough and in a strong position to face down the economic headwinds that have followed. Again, Labour Members might show at least a bit of remorse for their spineless, vacuous fence-sitting. The right hon. and learned Gentleman shakes his head, but I thought that the leader of the Labour party would appreciate the opportunity to look back with the benefit of hindsight at some of the mistakes that he has made. That is what he does; that is what they do.

I listened very carefully to the right hon. and learned Gentleman and the list of criticisms that he levelled at the Government. At the end—he bored on for quite some time—he said:

“I know that there has been fearmongering that this motion might lead straight to a general election…that is complete nonsense”.

It must be the first time in history that the Leader of an Opposition has pushed for a vote of no confidence but has not come out and called for a general election. That is the Labour party under the right hon. and learned Gentleman: all critique, no cojones.

Now, as we face a global fight against inflation, caused by the aftershocks of covid and the war in Ukraine, we again face a series of tough calls. We have put in place, under this Government and under this Prime Minister, an unprecedented package of targeted support to help those struggling the most to make ends meet. But we have to control inflation, we have to rein it, and that includes the way we address public sector wage demands. The consequence of failing to curb inflation—the direct result of giving in to excessive public sector wage demands—would be to keep inflation higher for longer and to have a further increase in interest rates. That reckless abdication would hit the poorest the hardest, and it would strike not just the lowest incomes in our society but the mortgages of working and middle-class families across the country. Conservative Members are committed to that wage restraint, coupled with an extensive package of support for the poorest and most vulnerable to get inflation down as soon as possible, which is the only credible approach.

What has Labour been doing about it? Members on the Labour Front Bench ignored the leader of their party and defied the memorandum that he sent in June ordering them not to back the RMT union. They actively backed the most militant demands led by that union, whose irresponsible strike action caused widespread disruption to people’s lives and livelihoods. It was not just the usual virtue-signalling tweets; many of those Members joined the RMT picket lines, backing the unions over the public. The right hon. and learned Gentleman showed that he cannot control or lead his party, and he cannot stand up to the public in the face of strikes coming down the line.

[Michael Fabricant]

I am very grateful to my right hon. Friend for giving way. He may not agree with me, but I think that he is being a little unfair to the Leader of the Opposition. The pointless motion today, which he knows—[Interruption.] Oh, yes! The Leader of the Opposition demanded it, and the Leader of the Opposition is now getting it. The motion that he asked for and is getting today will unite the Conservative party more than anything else that he could possibly have done.

[Dominic Raab]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. What is more, the behaviour of those on the Labour Benches will unite the country. We know why they have not stood up to the unions, including the RMT, since 2015. The Labour party HQ and the local Labour party branches have guzzled up some £68 million in donations from the unions. It is the same old story. The Labour party cannot stand up for the people of this country because it is so deeply buried in the pockets of the unions.

While Labour Members play their games and stand on the side of the unions rather than the public, we will get on with delivering for the British people: unemployment close to a 50-year low, a rise in the national insurance threshold—