Seasonal Work

Debate between Nigel Huddleston and Luke Evans

Wednesday 10th December 2025 Commons Chamber

[Nigel Huddleston (Droitwich and Evesham) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House regrets Government policies that are making seasonal, flexible and part-time work more difficult; notes that these policies particularly impact young people who are likely to start their first job in the hospitality, leisure and retail sectors, and specifically regrets Government policy to increase business rates on the hospitality, leisure and retail sectors; further regrets the Employment Rights Bill, with its provisions on guaranteed hours, and late notice cancellation of shifts, which will effectively destroy seasonal, flexible and part-time work; also regrets raising the rate of employer National Insurance contributions; regrets that 84,000 jobs in the hospitality sector have therefore been lost; and calls on the Government to cut public expenditure in order to abolish business rates for thousands of high street businesses, and not to proceed with the Employment Rights Bill so that it is easier for young people to get their first job, and easier for people to move from receiving welfare into work.

Last year’s Budget, with its increases in national insurance contributions, increases in business rates and inflation-busting pay rises, led to more than 180,000 job losses, because it increased the cost of labour. Most economists, and indeed most sensible people, understand that when you increase the price of something, there is less demand for it. By increasing the cost of jobs, Labour caused unemployment—yet this year, fully aware of rising unemployment, the Chancellor remarkably came back for more. Along with her colleagues in the Cabinet, she is imposing even more costs on business through the unemployment Bill, with more regulations and a whole new set of taxes, like the tourism tax. These decisions will do even more damage, snatching the opportunity of a first job, a seasonal job or an entire career from young people—and, indeed, people of all ages.

[Dr Luke Evans (Hinckley and Bosworth) (Con)]

On the tourism tax, only a couple of months ago, in response to a question that I had posed, the then Minister for Creative Industries, Arts and Tourism, the hon. Member for Rhondda and Ogmore (Chris Bryant), said, “We think they have been taxed enough.” Is it a surprise to Opposition Members to see a tourism tax being brought forward?

[Nigel Huddleston]

Yes, indeed; my hon. Friend makes an important point. I was here when the Minister said that. He said that there were “no plans” to bring in a tax—although clearly there were, because a few weeks later, one was brought in—and that the sector had been “taxed enough”. Well, I agree with that Minister, and I therefore do not agree with the Chancellor.

Not content with the damage to businesses and jobs done in last year’s Budget, this year the Chancellor decided to go even further in her latest Budget, and went for the pockets of working people directly by making them pay more tax. That was a clear manifesto breach. Working people are paying the price for this Government’s inability to tackle the ballooning welfare bill, and to control the unions and their own Back Benchers. The Budget was not about the economy; it was all about internal party management. It is appalling that we have a Chancellor who appears to be willing to see thousands of our constituents lose their jobs, as long as she saves hers. In short, the Budget was a £26 billion tax hike on working people to pay for Labour's welfare spending. Last year’s Budget destroyed jobs; this latest one disincentivised work. It takes a special kind of incompetence to destabilise both the demand and the supply of labour simultaneously, but this Government have somehow managed to do just that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Nigel Huddleston]

The hon. Gentleman’s final words are key: how are public services paid for? The top 1% of income tax payers in this country pay 29% of all income tax. It is estimated that the Labour Government’s policies have led to 16,000 of the wealthiest people in this country leaving—equivalent to a third of a million to half a million average taxpayers. The burden, therefore, is spread on the others. Instead of demonising some of the wealthiest people, who make an incredible contribution to our public services, maybe the Government should thank them.

[Dr Luke Evans]

It is not just wealthy people who have left. We know from the Office for National Statistics data that 257,000 Brits have gone—it had been estimated at 70,000—of whom about two thirds to three quarters are under the age of 35. We are losing young people to the rest of the world because of the implications of not being able to get a job in this country.

[Nigel Huddleston]

Yet more common sense is coming from those on this side of the Chamber, and I agree with my hon. Friend. Of course, it is young people in particular who do not have confidence in this Government and are fleeing.

It is clear that I do not have particularly high regard for Labour’s economic competence, but even I did not expect the Government to be running out of money quite so quickly. I expected them to be bad, but I did not expect them to be this bad. It does not give me any political joy to say that, because my constituents and their constituents are paying the price for Labour’s incompetence through higher taxes and, in many cases, with their jobs and livelihoods. I genuinely wish that they were better at government, but that is wishful thinking, because here is another hard truth about Labour: despite the party’s name and the false advocacy for working people, every Labour Government since the second world war have left office with unemployment higher than when they started, leaving the Conservatives to clear up their mess.

We Conservatives know that the best thing we can do for working people, and to lift people out of poverty, is to help them get a job, and we have a far better record than Labour in doing that. Between 2010 and 2024, Conservative-led Governments oversaw the creation of 4 million jobs—an average of 800 a day. This Government are destroying jobs by the tune of hundreds per day.