Amendment of the Law

Owen Smith Excerpts

Friday 23rd March 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Russell Brown (Dumfries and Galloway) (Lab)]

rose—

[Owen Smith (Pontypridd) (Lab)]

rose—

[Justine Greening]

I will not give way; I am still replying to an intervention. The worst thing that Britain could do right now is to listen to the siren voices of the Opposition. They are very good at criticising, but they have absolutely no credible alternative, and that is probably the key message that will come across to the public who are watching this debate.

From easing access to credit and bringing down the cost of borrowing for small businesses, to cutting corporation tax and reforming the planning system, the measures set out in this Budget will help to get growth back into our economy. They will also help to rebalance the economy by supporting our companies—wealth creators shifting UK plc from a spend-and-borrow path under the previous Government to a make-and-sell future under this one.

[Owen Smith]

Will the Minister confirm that the Office for Budget Responsibility tells us that next year the volume of investment by British companies in the UK will go down by 0.7%—that is, 7% down on the previous year’s estimate? Is that right?

[Justine Greening]

If the hon. Gentleman reads the whole OBR report, he will realise that Britain is an economy that operates in a global marketplace. Of course, his solution to the challenges faced in that global marketplace is to go and join all the countries that are facing problems, not to tackle our own economic crisis that his party left us. I assume that most, if not all the interventions that I get from Labour Members will be cherry-picked statistics that offer no alternative solutions to the challenges facing Britain.

--- Later in debate ---

[Owen Smith]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree, however, that the 4.7 million pensioners who will be impacted by the age-related allowances policy will not be pleased to learn that the House of Commons Library note on the Budget concludes that they will be between £80 and £280 worse off in real terms as a result of its provisions?

[Mr Jackson]

The independent Institute for Fiscal Studies disagrees profoundly with the hon. Gentleman, and believes that the proposals are both morally and financially right and progressive. The hon. Gentleman will therefore have to try again later.

I support the planning regime reforms and the liberalisation of the national planning policy framework. I was delighted to hear about the regional policy and the expansion of airports in the south-east as well. We are currently losing our competitive advantage to Schiphol, Frankfurt and Charles de Gaulle. I am delighted, too, that the Chancellor resisted the temptation to limit further tax relief on higher-rate pension contributions. That would have been an attack on thrift and prudence. We in Cambridgeshire are very pleased with the news about the A14 and the Get Britain Building and Growing Places funding. Moreover, I have been campaigning for quite some time for residential estate investment trusts for social housing, and the previous Government did nothing about that in 13 years.

It would be wrong to say that I am happy with every measure in the Budget. There were some missed opportunities and missed steps. Fuel duty is an issue that will return—as it would do for any Chancellor and Government. I understand why changes were not made this time, but my constituents’ petrol bills are hurting, and using a car is a necessity, not a luxury. Air passenger duty must be looked at again, too. It has increased 360% in the last seven years. Because of the major impact on transportation and tourism, I hope that the Chancellor will revisit that issue. I should declare an interest: Thomas Cook has a headquarters in my constituency.

The House will know that I had very serious concerns about the child benefit policy, but the Chancellor has listened and taken them on board. We have addressed the cliff-edge issue, although there is still the anomaly of the two earners as opposed to the one earner; we should regard that as a work in progress. My constituents are also asking why our European Union contribution has increased between the pre-Budget report and this Budget. It may be a function of reduced co-payment of funds for EU projects. If we are all in this together, however, that should include the European Union, so we must look at that issue.

I was very disappointed that, once again, the Budget did not contain a policy to recognise marriage in the tax system. For probably as little as £800 million—less than a third of the £3 billion we spent on taking people out of lower rate tax, in order to appease, as it were, our Liberal Democrat friends—we could have given a tax break to married couples with children under 3. I am sorry that that did not happen.

Things will be tough over the next few years. Restoring economic health after the 13 years of the last Labour Government—years of waste, profligacy and creating a client state—was never going to be easy. Once again, the job of getting the finances of this country straight and of building a great Britain and a strong economy falls to a Conservative Government, and I believe that this Chancellor has proved he is up to the task.