Business of the House

Pat McFadden Excerpts

Thursday 13th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Sir George Young]

I would welcome such a debate. I do not know whether my hon. Friend has looked at The Times or The Guardian today, but apparently at a meeting of the shadow Cabinet, the Leader of the Opposition at last recognised that they had been in deficit denial and they decided to abandon such a policy. I hope that we can have a debate on the black hole and welcome the fact that the Labour party, which was responsible for the black hole, now recognises that. Labour will have no credibility at all until it comes up with some proposals for dealing with it.

[Mr Pat McFadden (Wolverhampton South East) (Lab)]

Will the Leader of the House schedule a debate on the future of the financial inclusion fund and the wider issue of funding for citizens advice bureaux? The citizens advice bureau in the city of Wolverhampton does a fantastic job, and I am sure bureaux do so in the constituencies of right hon. and hon. Members across the House. Does he accept that it is perverse to be cutting funds to citizens advice bureaux for advice on debt relief and financial management at the same time as the Government are making wider cuts in benefits that are driving more people to seek the advice for which they are cutting the funding?

[Sir George Young]

I am sorry that the right hon. Gentleman did not have an opportunity to put that question during BIS questions, when it would have been appropriately dealt with. I pay tribute to the work of the CABs, as all hon. Members do, and I hope that, as local authorities make difficult decisions, they will try to do their best to preserve the funding of CABs, to which people look at a time of recession and real problems of hardship. A £100 million fund is available to help certain charities, and I do not know whether the right hon. Gentleman has thought of applying to that.