Finance (No. 3) Bill

Penny Mordaunt Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd May 2011 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening]

No, we have heard enough from Labour Members.

We had to take decisions to support motorists in spite of the catastrophic state of public finances that Labour handed over. We have made sure that there are no fuel duty increases this year by deferring the inflation-only increase that was planned for April to 1 January 2012. This is real help for families and for businesses. As of 1 April, average pump prices are approximately 6p per litre lower than if we had continued with the previous Government’s escalator.

[Penny Mordaunt (Portsmouth North) (Con)]

I have listened to this debate with great interest, because I was previously spokesman for the Freight Transport Association and I remember that one year into the Labour Government’s stewardship of the fuel duty escalator hauliers were on the streets of London on a go-slow programme because of the way that they approached taxation.

[Justine Greening]

My hon. Friend is right to refer to the response of hauliers to the previous Government’s policy.

The hon. Member for York Central called the action that the Government have taken for hauliers in the Budget “slight”. Actually, the average haulier will benefit by approximately £1,700 in 2010-11 as a result of those measures compared with what they would otherwise have faced. I also draw his attention to the remaining part of the package for motorists, which includes freezing vehicle excise duty on HGVs, providing further help to hauliers. The package is even broader than that, because for motorists who are required to use their own vehicle for work, the approved mileage allowance payments rate, which had not been increased by the previous Government since 2002, was increased from 40p to 45p per mile for the first 10,000 miles. An average AMAPs user claiming for 2,500 miles a year will benefit by £125 a year.