Oral Answers to Questions

Peter Tapsell Excerpts

Wednesday 24th October 2012 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

The right hon. Lady makes an important point. This is an international problem that all countries are struggling with: how to make sure that companies pay tax in an appropriate way. I am not happy with the current situation; Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs needs to look at it very carefully. We need to make sure that we are encouraging these businesses to invest in our country—as they are doing—but they should be paying fair taxes as well.

[Sir Peter Tapsell (Louth and Horncastle) (Con)]

May I ask my right hon. Friend why, as he told me on Monday, he thinks that the single currency needs a banking union, as the crisis in the euro has been caused not by the absence of a banking union, but by the absence of a single fiscal policy? Yet, if a fiscal union were introduced, it would certainly be dominated by Germany, and that would lead to the death of democracy throughout most of Europe. So is not the least painful solution the abolition of the euro and the return to national currencies?

[The Prime Minister]

What I would say to my right hon. Friend is that I believe that the insecurity in the eurozone is caused in part by both those issues: the lack of a fiscal union, but also the lack of a banking union. One of the problems in the eurozone at the moment is the different level of interest rates in Spain, Italy and Portugal, which is in part because of concerns about the link between weak banks and sovereign Governments. Only when we have a banking union will there be greater security about those weak banks. We have a single currency in the United Kingdom, and we also have a banking union in the United Kingdom; we would not treat banks differently because they are in Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland, rather than in England. I believe a working single currency will need a working banking union; I think that is logically consistent and sensible.

Oral Answers to Questions

Peter Tapsell Excerpts

Wednesday 4th July 2012 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

The credit easing policy—the national loan guarantee scheme—is going to make available £20 billion of extra loans; some of that money is already available. The Merlin scheme saw lending to small businesses go up in 2011. It is difficult when the banks are nervous about the economic situation, but the Treasury and the Bank of England are doing all that they can, including through the Merlin agreement, to get money out of the banks and into hard-pressed businesses.

[Sir Peter Tapsell (Louth and Horncastle) (Con)]

If, as a result of this shameful banking crisis, bank executives are dismissed or forced to resign, and the boards of their banks fail to act appropriately, will the Government do their best to ensure that the delinquents are not able to walk away with their bonuses and severance payments?

[The Prime Minister]

The Father of the House makes an extremely good point. It would be completely wrong if people who were leaving in those circumstances were given some vast pay-off. It would be completely inexplicable to the British public, and it would not be right. I very much hope that it does not happen. In terms of what the Government can do, we are going to legislate so that all pay deals are put to shareholders with a binding vote, and those deals should include any severance payments. The party opposite had 13 years to do that; we are going to do it in two.

Oral Answers to Questions

Peter Tapsell Excerpts

Wednesday 16th May 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. Perhaps we can now make progress with short questions and short answers.

[Sir Peter Tapsell (Louth and Horncastle) (Con)]

Does my right hon. Friend suppose that Chancellor Merkel now regrets that she did not take the advice he gave her last October about the big bazooka? If she had fired it then, that would have spared the European Union from its present crisis.