Budget Resolutions Debate
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Nusrat Ghani
Main Page: Nusrat Ghani (Conservative - Sussex Weald)Department Debates - View all Nusrat Ghani's debates with the Department for Business and Trade
(1 day, 23 hours ago)
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Dr Opher
I understand that it will be mitigated through funding. I am not exactly sure how, but I have no doubt—[Interruption.] That is because I have not been informed, but I have no doubt that it will be coped with. I know that this Government will rebuild general practice, just as the Conservative party trashed it and broke the back of it. I am not taking any criticism from any of you about the NHS.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)
Order. Please be seated. You are not taking any criticism from me. You said “you”. Please do not refer to colleagues as “you”.
Dr Opher
Sorry. I did get rather angry there, and I shall not get angry any more.
Let me talk about GP access. We need to get doctors, not receptionists or 111, to perform triage, and we need to start thinking in a different way. We do not want a protocol-driven NHS; what we need is a genuine doctor-patient relationship. We also need to develop neighbourhood—
Graham Stuart
No, it is relevant here. I wonder whether it is in order for the hon. Gentleman to have been given assurances by the Government that funding will be put in place to mitigate the impact on GPs, because that information has repeatedly been refused to this House. I know, Madam Deputy Speaker that you represent all Back Benchers, like me, in making sure the truth is out.
Madam Deputy Speaker
You can definitely raise that in your contribution later. It is not a point of order for the Chair, but no doubt the Minister and Front Benchers have heard and can respond accordingly.
Dr Opher, you will shortly run out of time, so I would be quick.
Dr Opher
Okay. I worked in general practice for 30 years. There is always mitigation for tax changes, and I have no doubt that the Government will look after GPs.
Ben Maguire
Bank shares are soaring following this Budget. Does my hon. Friend agree that the Liberal Democrat proposal to reverse the Conservative Government’s cut to the big bank levy, raising around £4 billion a year, would mean that we would not need the GP tax, the family farm tax or the winter fuel cut and that we could fund upgrades to the Treliske, Derriford and North Devon hospitals—
Martin Wrigley
My hon. Friend is absolutely right: there are other ways that this money could have been found. The Liberal Democrats have long been saying that we should be looking to the banks, the big oil companies and the big international tech companies to pay their fair share, and that is where money should be sought.
There is nothing in the Budget for Devon’s essential transport. Last year’s pothole fund was a “drop in the ocean”, according to Devon County Council, and the 50% increase in this Budget still leaves a big hole. Not even mentioned in the Budget is the completion of the Dawlish rail resilience project, which is key to connecting the south-west. Without funding, the design team will soon be redeployed and all the progress to date will be lost. This project will cost millions more if it is not done now, and I urge the Minister to meet us to get it funded. Growth in the economy in Devon and Cornwall is heavily dependent on fast, reliable train services, and we saw what happened with Dawlish.
The Budget also mentioned housing and local government. Until July, I was leader of my district council, and I am proud that the Lib Dem administration started building council homes—the first in 30 years. They were cheap to rent and cheap to heat because they were well insulated and powered by air source heat pumps and solar power. Additional capital for social homes is welcome, but the frozen local housing allowance hampers housing associations that have already scaled back their plans for development, and commercial developers will still try to cut affordable homes from section 106 responsibilities.
The Budget also offers 300 new planning officers, but those are spread very thinly over the 326 planning authorities. Newton Abbot’s social housing need has increased by 50%. In my constituency—like in Ely—the average house price is 11 times the average earnings and rents have soared. The broken housing market is failing Newton Abbot, and the proposed changes to the planning rules are insufficient to fix it. Homes are unreachable for too many families. People are being denied the right to a safe and secure place to call home.
I welcome the multi-year settlements for councils and the removal of the “Hunger Games”-style bidding for grants involving huge amounts of wasted efforts writing bids and unachievable timeframes. We cannot let that centralised control continue. We need real devolution, but devolution is not just reorganisation—
Rosie Wrighting (Kettering) (Lab)
Like many of my hon. Friends, I have spent my career in business—specifically, in retail head offices—so I am proud to be a part of a Government that is pro-business and pro-worker. The last time a Labour Government delivered a Budget in this House, I was 12 years old. That Labour Government looked after our public services, focused on cutting crime, were ambitious about our education and invested in our NHS. It is because of those decisions that I had the opportunities that I did and that I am standing in this House today. Since then, those priorities have been forgotten and our constituents have had to bear the brunt.
People in my constituency of Kettering know all too well the price they have paid for the last 14 years of Tory failure: crumbling hospitals and schools, rising crime and a crisis in SEND. Working people in this country have not had a Government who have worked for them for 14 years. It is shameful that the previous Conservative Government promised funding that simply did not exist. They let our communities think that they were going to receive money, knowing that it was not there and that it would be someone else’s problem after the election.
We now finally have a Labour Government and a truly Labour Budget that prioritises working people. It is incredible to be the youngest woman in the House today, but it is even more incredible to have watched the first female Chancellor deliver the first Labour Budget in 14 years. It shows me and many young women that there is no limit to our ambitions. Regardless of what the Leader of the Opposition thinks, this was a glass ceiling shattered.
There are some hugely important measures in this Budget for the people of Kettering. Our public services deserve better than the treatment they have had for the last 14 years, and I am proud to be part of a Labour Government who are fixing the foundations and rebuilding Britain. People all over the country are waiting to see what this Government will deliver and, thanks to this Budget, we can give them hope that they will have an NHS fit for the future and a country that invites investment, without barriers to opportunity, and in which working people are at the heart of everything we do.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)
Order. To ensure that I can get in as many people as possible, there should be no further interventions.
Catherine Atkinson (Derby North) (Lab)
My constituents go to work to make trains, planes and automobiles at Alstom, Rolls-Royce and Toyota, and they work in their supply chains. This Budget delivers ambitious plans for rail infrastructure, nearly £100 million in R&D funding for aerospace, and £2 billion to support the automotive sector. To get to work, many of my constituents commute; 1.2 billion vehicle miles were travelled on Derby’s roads last year. The fuel duty freeze and the extra half a billion pounds to fix potholes are hugely welcome.
My constituents teach and learn at our great university and schools. They treat others and are treated at the Royal Derby hospital. They work in our shops and restaurants, and on the building sites where the regeneration of our city is taking shape. We in Derby are laying the foundations for growth—literally. Building is under way on a new university business school, a new mental health unit at Kingsway and a new performance venue at Becketwell. At Friar Gate goods yard, which has stood derelict for over 50 years, new homes and businesses are being built. There is also investment in our theatres—£20 million of funding that this Budget underwrites.
We needed and got a Budget that supported our ambitions. Last week, I went from the Budget statement to a meeting of small businesses in my constituency, which was organised by the Federation of Small Businesses. We discussed how this Budget will grow the cake, from investment in skills and reform of business rates to the approval of the east midlands investment zone and start-up loans. This is a Budget that is, at last, honest about the public finances being in a mess, and we have made tough decisions so that our businesses can have the stability and certainty they need.
To rebuild Britain, however, we also need to reset the broken contract with working people. For 14 years, in Budget after Budget, from austerity to Liz Truss’s mini-Budget, working people were barely offered crumbs from the table, while productivity and growth flatlined—but no more. Working people now have a proper seat at the table. The minimum wage will increase from £11.44 to £12.21 an hour next April, which will affect one in 10 Derby North workers. For 18 to 20-year-olds, there will be a 16% increase to £10 an hour. Derby has the second highest average salaries outside London, so for those moving on with their careers, there will be a rise in the income tax and national insurance contributions thresholds from 2028-29. Finally, investment—
Sam Rushworth (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)
The Conservative party was keen for us all to declare our membership of trade unions in the debate on the Employment Rights Bill, so we should probably all declare that most of us received funding from businesses during the general election campaign. I certainly did, and I pay tribute to the small businesses in my constituency. Some 89% of them are considered microbusinesses with fewer than 10 employees, so the majority will pay less national insurance under this Budget. I thank the Chancellor for protecting working people and small businesses.
Listening to Conservative Members, as we have been doing for the past five hours, it seems that many of them see the business community as caring about nothing but quick profits and avoiding tax, but the local businesses that I speak to are proud not only to deliver quality products and services, but to create good jobs and strengthen the local economy. They have been doing that in trying circumstances, and many of them have supported Labour candidates at this election because they want a Government who match their ambition. When I ask them what they want to see from Government, they say they want not only a fair tax system but investment, and that is what this Budget delivers. They want a secure power supply. They also want faster planning decisions, including the young farmer who came to see me because he has been pushed back for two years now in his attempt to just build some pig pens.
The biggest barrier, however, is that businesses cannot get the staff, and this is true from manufacturing to hospitality. Britain is held back by a skills shortage, so I welcome a Budget that will invest in Britain’s most precious, productive asset: her people. When we invest in faster NHS appointments, in emergency dentistry, in mental health, in SEND provision, in specialist teachers in STEM subjects and in childcare, we invest in business too, because these are the people who will rebuild Britain.
The people of Durham have been held back for too long. In the past 14 years, our life expectancy has fallen behind. Our children are shorter, and the number of children in care has increased by 250%, so we can see the impact of austerity in people’s bodies and family life. I welcome a Budget that has brought the end of austerity and begun the long, hard job of rebuilding this country. I also welcome a Budget that has put more money in people’s pockets, including by honouring the triple lock, which the Conservatives failed to do in 2022, costing pensioners in my constituency £488.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)
We come to the final Back-Bench speaker, Patrick Hurley.
Patrick Hurley (Southport) (Lab)
When I stand to speak in this House, I often criticise the former Government, and to be fair, there was a lot to criticise, but Liz Truss at least got one thing right. She claimed to make economic growth the driving force behind her plans, but while Truss took a reckless big-bang approach to tackling the stagnation that this country has experienced since 2010, our focus is on long-term investment, not short-term tax cuts. This speaks to one of many big problems with recent Tory Governments—a problem that any business owner in this country could tell you about. It is all about return on investment. Over the last 14 years, there has been too little return because there has been too little investment. To combat that, we have secured £63 billion in private investment, and we have put £2 billion into electric vehicle development. I note, too, that the UK Space Agency says that the space industry is worth £17 billion a year to our economy. It is no doubt helping to ensure that we get early warning of any new super-massive black holes we might not be aware of.
This Budget is the beginning of the change our country voted for. It will make Britain better off; there will be more money in people’s pockets, an NHS that is there when people need it, businesses creating wealth and opportunity for all, the house building that we need, the transport infrastructure that we are crying out for, wages that make work pay, and a state pension that is uprated as it should have been all along. This is a Budget of change, a Budget of investment and growth, a Budget to put more money in working people’s pockets, and a Budget to get our public services back on their feet. It is the most welcome Budget for many years—a Budget in line with the values of the British people. I am proud to support this Labour Budget.
Tulip Siddiq
The right hon. Gentleman has intervened 18 times. I shall not give him another chance.
Let me continue. That is the only way that we can really fix the foundations. Of course, that involves taking tough decisions, particularly on spending and taxation, but I will take no lectures from those who were content to levy a £22 billion pound tax on this country’s future, and, through their unfunded spending commitments, attempt to undemocratically bind the hands of a future Government. Well, guess what? This Government will do things differently. While the previous Government allowed investment in our country to fall to its lowest level on record, this Government will put investment at the heart of everything that we do.
That is why we held the international investment summit in October—to show firms at home and abroad that Britain is open for business once more. That is why we have introduced a new fiscal rule—the investment rule—which, alongside appropriate guardrails provided by the OBR and our new stability rule, means that this Government can meaningfully invest in our country’s future.
Of course, investment means taking a long-term view. As anyone who has bought a property, built a business or raised a family will know, the early days are always the hardest. But if they take the hard calls now, in time they will get back far more than they put in. I pick those examples deliberately, but with regret. The sad truth is that, for working people—particularly young people—up and down the country, home ownership, entrepreneurship and starting a family have never been more distant. This Budget will start to change that.
Our manifesto made a clear commitment to get Britain building again. This Budget puts the first shovels in the ground, with a commitment to spend an average of 2.6% of GDP on public sector net investment over the course of this Parliament. This will include an additional £500 million in new funding for social and affordable homes, which brings total investment in housing supply to more than £5 billion and supports the delivery of tens of thousands of new homes.
We will build more than just homes; we need to build communities. Infrastructure is key to tying those communities together while ensuring that they plug into the wider economy. [Interruption.] The shadow Foreign Secretary asks how. If she listens, she will learn, so she should pay attention. Getting our country moving again will be key to growing the economy. [Interruption.] She should not chunter from the Front Bench. She needs to listen, because our commitment to infrastructure investment will help us to do so—by, for instance, increasing local roads investment by £500 million in 2024-25. These are the things that the previous Government failed to do, but we will deliver for our country. For working families, that means less time wasted dodging potholes and more time for the things that actually matter. Of course, infrastructure helps not just families but firms. In an increasingly volatile world, Government should play an important role in securing our energy supply so that firms can price that into their business plan.
We heard powerful and authentic maiden speeches today from my hon. Friends the Members for North Ayrshire and Arran (Irene Campbell), for Stoke-on-Trent North (David Williams) and for Sherwood Forest (Michelle Welsh). We will see them as huge assets to Parliament. Some of them mentioned that their families did not think that they would get here; I am really pleased that their families were wrong.
I will finish by echoing something that the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for North Bedfordshire (Richard Fuller), said. It is not often that I agree with him, but he said that we had choices. The truth is that we did have choices, and guess what? We chose to act. In 10 years’ time, the country will look back on this Budget as the moment when we got Britain’s future back. In the future, the economy will have grown because at this moment we chose to prioritise a healthy workforce; we will have record levels of investment because we prioritised fiscal and economic responsibility; and people will have more money in their pockets because we prioritised protecting hard-working people’s payslips. The merry-go-round of austerity and economic irresponsibility is over. We made a choice—a choice to rebuild Britain.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That income tax is charged for the tax year 2025-26.
And it is declared that it is expedient in the public interest that this Resolution should have statutory effect under the provisions of the Provisional Collection of Taxes Act 1968.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)
Let me explain what will happen next. I am now required under Standing Order No. 51(3) to put successively, without further debate, the Question on each of the Ways and Means motions numbered 2 to 62, and the money motion on which the Finance Bill is to be brought in. These motions are set out in a separate paper distributed with today’s Order Paper.
The Deputy Speaker put forthwith the Questions necessary to dispose of the motions made in the name of the Chancellor of the Exchequer (Standing Order No. 51(3)).
2. Income tax (main rates)
Resolved,
That for the tax year 2025-26 the main rates of income tax are as follows—
(a) the basic rate is 20%,
(b) the higher rate is 40%, and
(c) the additional rate is 45%.
And it is declared that it is expedient in the public interest that this Resolution should have statutory effect under the provisions of the Provisional Collection of Taxes Act 1968.
3. Income tax (default and savings rates)
Resolved,
That—
(1) For the tax year 2025-26 the default rates of income tax are as follows—
(a) the default basic rate is 20%,
(b) the default higher rate is 40%, and
(c) the default additional rate is 45%.
(2) For the tax year 2025-26 the savings rates of income tax are as follows—
(a) the savings basic rate is 20%,
(b) the savings higher rate is 40%, and
(c) the savings additional rate is 45%.
And it is declared that it is expedient in the public interest that this Resolution should have statutory effect under the provisions of the Provisional Collection of Taxes Act 1968.
4. Income tax (starting rate limit for savings)
Resolved,
That—
(1) For the tax year 2025-26 the amount specified in section 12(3) of the Income Tax Act 2007 (the starting rate limit for savings) is “£5,000”.
(2) Accordingly, section 21 of that Act (indexation) does not apply in relation to the starting rate limit for savings for that tax year.
And it is declared that it is expedient in the public interest that this Resolution should have statutory effect under the provisions of the Provisional Collection of Taxes Act 1968.
5. Income tax (appropriate percentage for cars)
Resolved,
That (notwithstanding anything to the contrary in the practice of the House relating to the matters that may be included in Finance Bills) provision may be made taking effect in a future year increasing the appropriate percentages mentioned in sections 139 to 142 of the Income Tax (Earnings and Pensions) Act 2003.
6. Capital gains tax (the main rates)
Question put,
That—
(1) In section 1H of the Taxation of Chargeable Gains Act 1992 (the main rates of CGT)—
(a) omit subsection (1A) (which sets out the rates for residential property gains accruing to individuals),
(b) in subsection (3) (which sets out the rates for gains accruing to individuals that are not residential property gains or carried interest gains)—
(i) for “10%” substitute “18%”, and
(ii) for “20%” substitute “24%”,
(c) omit subsection (4A) (which sets out the rates for residential property gains accruing to personal representatives),
(d) in subsection (6) (which sets out the rates for gains accruing to personal representatives that are not residential property gains or carried interest gains), for “20%” substitute “24%”,
(e) omit subsection (7) (which sets out the rates for residential property gains accruing to trustees), and
(f) in subsection (8) (which sets out the rates for gains accruing to trustees that are not residential property gains or carried interest gains)—
(i) omit “Other”, and
(ii) for “20%” substitute “24%”.
(2) The amendments made by this Resolution have effect in relation to disposals made on or after 30 October 2024.
(3) If an asset is transferred on or after 30 October 2024 under an unconditional contract made before that date, the disposal is, despite section 28(1) of the Taxation of Chargeable Gains Act 1992, to be treated for the purposes of the amendments made by this Resolution as taking place at the time the asset is transferred (rather than at the time the contract is made) unless the contract is an excluded contract.
(4) A contract is an excluded contract if—
(a) obtaining an advantage by reason of the application of section 28(1) of the Taxation of Chargeable Gains Act 1992 was no purpose of entering into the contract, and
(b) where the parties to the contract are connected persons, the contract was entered into wholly for commercial reasons.
(5) A contract is not to be regarded as an excluded contract unless the person making the transfer makes a claim which includes a statement that the contract meets the conditions to be an excluded contract.
(6) But no claim is required if the total amount of—
(a) the chargeable gain accruing on the disposal, and
(b) the chargeable gains accruing on all other disposals made under excluded contracts, does not exceed £100,000.
(7) For this purpose the amount of any gain accruing on a qualifying business disposal is to be taken to be the amount of the gain under section 169N(2) of the Taxation of Chargeable Gains Act 1992.
(8) If the person making the transfer makes—
(a) a claim under section 169M of the Taxation of Chargeable Gains Act 1992 in relation to a qualifying business disposal (business asset disposal relief), or
(b) a claim under section 169VM of that Act (investors’ relief) in relation to a disposal, section 169M(2) and (3) of that Act, or (as the case may be) section 169VM(1) and (2) of that Act, apply to a claim under paragraph (5) in relation to the disposal as they apply to a claim under the section concerned.
(9) In this Resolution “qualifying business disposal” has the meaning given by Chapter 3 of Part 5 of the Taxation of Chargeable Gains Act 1992.
(10) In this Resolution any reference to the transfer of an asset includes its conveyance.
And it is declared that it is expedient in the public interest that this Resolution should have statutory effect under the provisions of the Provisional Collection of Taxes Act 1968.