Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Michael Meacher and John Bercow

Wednesday 15th July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Last but not least, Mr Michael Meacher.

[Mr Michael Meacher (Oldham West and Royton) (Lab)]

Q13. If this is such a great economic recovery, why are wages still 6% below the pre-crisis level of seven years ago? Why was the growth rate in the last quarter a mere 0.4%? Why has productivity been flat for five years? Why is UK investment as a proportion of GDP one of the lowest in the world? And why is the balance of payments in traded goods now in deficit by £100 billion a year?

Welfare Reforms and Poverty

Debate between Michael Meacher and John Bercow

Monday 13th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Michael Meacher (Oldham West and Royton) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. We have just had a very important debate and a very decisive result—the House has spoken strongly, by 125 to two. I do not think that anyone could deny that this is a critically important issue. Can we therefore be assured that the Minister will respond, either now or tomorrow, in order to answer the fact that Parliament has decided and the Government should take note?

[Mr Speaker]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his point of order, but it is not a matter for the Chair. If the Minister of State wants to respond, he can, but he is under no obligation to do so. [Interruption.] No, the Minister does not wish to respond. The right hon. Gentleman’s point stands on the record.

Point of Order

Debate between Michael Meacher and John Bercow

Wednesday 20th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Michael Meacher (Oldham West and Royton) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. As you will have heard and as everyone else in the House heard, I asked a perfectly reasonable question that was based on clear documentary evidence, as I indicated. Is it parliamentary for the Prime Minister to respond by accusing another right hon. Member of sounding as if he has been taking mind-altering substances? Is that—[Interruption.]

[Mr Speaker]

Order. The right hon. Gentleman will complete his point of order. The Prime Minister has indicated a readiness to respond, and that is how we will proceed. A bit of patience is all that is required.

[Mr Meacher]

I want to ask, Mr Speaker, whether it is parliamentary to use such an unjustifiable, rude and offensive phrase about another hon. Member.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Michael Meacher and John Bercow

Wednesday 20th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I rather fear that that is true, having known the hon. Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis) for over 30 years.

[Mr Michael Meacher (Oldham West and Royton) (Lab)]

Is the Prime Minister aware that, according to The Economist, Britain is now 159th lowest in the world in terms of business investment, just behind Mali, Paraguay and Guatemala? Will he therefore please tell the House when, under his esteemed leadership and that of his Chancellor, Britain can expect to catch up with Mali?

Banking (Responsibility and Reform)

Debate between Michael Meacher and John Bercow

Tuesday 7th February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Margot James]

In fact, RBS has a reasonably good record of lending to small and medium-sized enterprises. It just missed its Merlin targets. It launched a new product at the end of last year for businesses with low fixed interest rates, no early repayment charges and no fees for the first three months. It is above the market average for small business loans. Some 40% of all SME loans are from RBS, which is—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I say gently to the hon. Lady that interventions must be brief. There is substantial pressure on time and I would like to accommodate Members.

[Mr Meacher]

The hon. Lady has obviously received a detailed RBS briefing. However, what she describes is very different from the experience of our constituents, who complain about how difficult it is to get loans and about the prohibitive conditions that are attached to them.

I want to make one more point. It is little recognised that 85% of the British public’s money is held by just five banks, which are able to use that money with little or no accountability to the public. Investment in the UK economy therefore reflects the interests not of the public or of society, but of the senior decision makers at the five largest banks. Given that the total gross spending of the banking sector in the run-up to the crash exceeded by far total Government spending, the decision makers in those banks potentially have more spending power to shape the UK economy than the whole machinery of Government. That is a significant fact. In effect, control over the money supply and the allocation of credit has been largely privatised. That is central to Britain’s problems.

Britain needs above all to escape the dangerously mounting deficit in our traded goods account, which in the last two years has been up to £100 billion a year or 7% of GDP. The allocation of credit cannot be left in the hands of private commercial banks, which currently channel only 8% of the money supply into productive investment. Instead, they generate colossal asset bubbles through mortgages and household borrowing.

What is needed is the re-adoption of the rationing of bank credit through official guidance, enforced where necessary through quantitative ceilings. That prevailed successfully in this country until the 1971 competition and credit control measures, which inaugurated the era that said that the market always knows best and in which the deregulation of finance depended almost exclusively on the price mechanism and variable interest rates.

Bonus figures released last week show that the top 1,250 executives in the eight leading London banks received an average of £1.8 million in 2010. That is £34,000 a week. What is really needed in banks, as elsewhere, is whole company pay bargaining, whereby the pay at each level, including at the top, has to pass the examination and approval not just of shareholders, but of the employed staff who are the bedrock of the organisation.

Comprehensive Spending Review

Debate between Michael Meacher and John Bercow

Wednesday 20th October 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. A very large number of right hon. and hon. Members are seeking to catch my eye, and I would like to accommodate as many of them as possible. I therefore issue my usual exhortation to brevity with particular force. Single supplementary questions, please, and economical replies from the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

[Mr Michael Meacher (Oldham West and Royton) (Lab)]

In cutting the deficit, why did the Chancellor ignore the economic growth dividend, which could yield at least £60 billion in extra Government tax revenues over the next five years? Why did he not tax at all the 1% super-rich, whose wealth has quadrupled over the past decade? And why did he not introduce a major public sector, as well as private sector, jobs and growth programme, which could most effectively cut benefit payments and increase tax revenues?