DWP: Performance

Debate between Rachel Reeves and Charlie Elphicke

Monday 30th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Rachel Reeves]

Of course I welcome the fact that unemployment, including youth unemployment, is now falling, but we have to face up to the fact that too many people in work are struggling to make ends meet. The hon. Gentleman will know from his constituency that some people who are in work have to rely on housing benefit and tax credits to make ends meet because they are not paid a wage they can afford to live on, they are on zero-hours contracts, or they are among the record numbers of people who are working part time but want to work full time. We need to address those challenges as well.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

Can the hon. Lady explain why the hon. Member for Dagenham and Rainham (Jon Cruddas) says that Labour’s welfare policies are cynical and punitive?

[Rachel Reeves]

It is all about ensuring that more people are in work through the compulsory jobs guarantee, ensuring that people have the skills to hold down a job with a basic skills test and a youth allowance, and doing more to ensure that people in work can earn enough to live on—through, for example, an increase in the minimum wage and ensuring that more people are paid the living wage. Those policies will make a huge difference to the hon. Gentleman’s constituents in Dover and Deal, which will be a Labour constituency after the next election.

--- Later in debate ---

[Rachel Reeves]

Government Members should listen rather than heckle, because my hon. Friend has made an incredibly important point. I recently went to Ringways garage in Farnley, in my constituency, to give someone the keys to a Motability car. That person talked about the difference that Motability made, in terms of independence and family. However, as my hon. Friend has said, we also know that, as a result of some of the Government’s reforms, many people who need to be helped to obtain the car that will give them the freedom that the rest of us take for granted have had that support taken away from them. The delays and the chaos is one thing, but there is also some of the substance of those decisions.

[Charlie Elphicke]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Rachel Reeves]

I have already given way to the hon. Gentleman, so, no, I will not.

I know that many hon. Members will have similar stories to tell today, and I hope the Secretary of State stays to listen, because when we write to the Department with our constituents’ problems we only ever get replies from the correspondence unit. I realise that the Secretary of State is probably deluged with letters raising problems.

National Minimum Wage

Debate between Rachel Reeves and Charlie Elphicke

Wednesday 15th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Rachel Reeves]

Not only are Government Members not 100% behind the national minimum wage; they cannot even bring themselves to say “national minimum wage”.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

The Government are asking the Low Pay Commission to review the minimum wage with a view to increasing it. Does the hon. Lady welcome that—yes or no?

[Rachel Reeves]

The hon. Gentleman is a little behind the curve. That is what the Low Pay Commission does: that is what we set it up to do.

The failure to enforce the legislation properly has contributed to a worrying rise in in-work poverty. It used to be thought that if someone got a job, put in the hours and put in the effort, they would be paid enough to keep them and their family out of poverty and have a decent standard of living—that was the deal. But today, for the first time since records began, the majority of people in poverty are in work and the majority of children in poverty are brought up in working households. It is just not good enough that in today’s Britain an honest day’s work does not bring in a decent day’s pay.

The Economy

Debate between Rachel Reeves and Charlie Elphicke

Tuesday 11th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Rachel Reeves]

Let us see what the rating agencies have to say in the new year. Of course we are on negative watch, but it was not we who said the rating agencies should be the be-all and end-all. Indeed, they were giving Lehman Brothers a triple A rating until that company crashed and almost took the global economy with it. It was the Chancellor who said that a triple A rating would be the watchword of his chancellorship, so if it were to go, it would be a damning indictment of what this Government have presided over.

What was the Government’s response to all the bad economic news last Wednesday? Let us give credit where it is due. The Chancellor now agrees with us that we should not go ahead with the fuel duty increase in January; he agrees with us that introducing regional pay in our public services would be costly and impractical; he agreed with us that we should reverse the relaxation of restrictions on pension tax relief for the very rich; he agreed with us that it was a mistake to implement deep cuts to capital programmes such as Building Schools for the Future; and he agreed with us that cutting investment allowances risked damaging incentives for long-term wealth creation. We propose the creation of a British investment bank to support small businesses, and the Chancellor has produced a pale imitation of that, but I am afraid that all these measures are too little, too late—robbing Peter to pay Paul. Smoke and mirrors will not hide the lack of a real, purposeful growth strategy.

The chief executive of British Airways summed it up yesterday when he said:

“I don’t see an agenda for growth.”

I agree, and so does the Office for Budget Responsibility. Taking into account all the Government’s measures from the autumn statement, the OBR has concluded that they will add just 0.1% to UK GDP over the next five years. The economy is shrinking this year. Growth next year—forecast at 2.9% just two years ago—is now forecast at just 1.2%. Indeed, we have seen downgrades not just this year and next, but the year after.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

Why does the Institute for Fiscal Studies say that there would be £200 billion more borrowing under Labour’s plans?

[Rachel Reeves]

There is £212 billion more borrowing under this Government’s plans.

Families will continue to feel the Chancellor’s failure in their wallets and their homes. Average earnings will not outpace inflation until the second quarter of 2014. It will take even longer for families to recover the loss to their living standards that this Government’s economic failure has cost them.

The lack of growth and the increase in borrowing under this Chancellor have meant that he has had to come back and ask the country for more. And who are the Government asking to bear the brunt of the past two and a half years of failure? Luckily, Andrew Neil asked the Chief Secretary to the Treasury that question on BBC1 last Wednesday. He asked him whether

“those who are on ordinary incomes are suffering a lot more than most”.

The Chief Secretary to the Treasury replied: “That is absolutely right.” That was the only sense he spoke all day. It is no surprise that he is increasingly described as the Conservatives’ favourite Liberal Democrat in the Cabinet. Apparently, they regard him as easier to deal with and more persuadable. The Chancellor’s favourite Liberal Democrat has finally told the country what we have known for a long time: that this Government are asking ordinary families to foot the bill for their economic mess.

The facts speak for themselves. Analysis by the House of Commons Library shows that a one-earner family on £20,000 with two children will lose £279 a year from next April. Slide 24 of the Institute for Fiscal Studies report shows that a two-income family with children will lose £534 as a result of the changes, including all the measures in the autumn statement. Slide 17 of the IFS assessment shows that middle and lower earners will lose most as a result of the autumn statement, with the poorest 40% losing more than the richest 10%. How can that be fair? And this is all to pay for the Government’s £212 billion of extra borrowing. They are hurting those who are trying to get on and do the best for themselves and their families. That cannot be fair.

Mothers across the country will be worried about the real-terms cut in maternity pay, worth £180, that the Chancellor announced last Wednesday. That comes on top of other deep cuts that will hit pregnant women on low incomes, such as the abolished Sure Start maternity allowance and the health in pregnancy grant. This is further proof that the Government are out of touch and simply do not understand the pressures families are facing, day in, day out.

[Rachel Reeves]

My hon. Friend is right. It is a false economy to cut the incomes of the lowest paid, because they will have less money to spend in their communities. What really matters, however, is the real impact that the changes will have on their living standards and those of their children.

The Resolution Foundation has said that 60% of the cuts to benefits and tax credits will hit working households—that is, those who are trying to get on in life. Given that the welfare bill is forecast to be £13.6 billion higher in this Parliament than the Chancellor thought it would be—another target tossed aside—perhaps it is time for the Government to concentrate on getting people back to work in order to reduce the welfare bill. In February this year, the former employment Minister, now the Secretary of State for Justice, said:

“The Work Programme is doing a good job and is on track. It is helping long-term unemployed people into work.”

And only today the Chief Secretary to the Treasury said that the scheme was going well, but we now know that for every 100 people who are unemployed, the programme has seen only two people back into work. If that is the Government’s idea of a programme that is on track, I would hate to see one that is not.

It is not surprising that OBR documents released last week showed that the number of people claiming jobseeker’s allowance was set to rise from 1.58 million this year to 1.69 million in 2014, and that the number forecast for 2016 had been revised up by 340,000. That will be a third of a million more people receiving JSA compared with the number forecast in March this year.

Let us not forget that the Prime Minister dismissed the last Labour Government’s future jobs fund, which helped 120,000 young people back into work, yet an impact analysis for the Department for Work and Pensions found that we all gained £7,750 per participant through wages, increased tax receipts and reduced benefit payments. This Government ditched a plan that worked for one that has failed, so we will not be lectured by them on welfare or on job creation.

At the same time, one group of people continue to gain from the Chancellor and the Chief Secretary’s policies. If someone earns more than £1 million a year, next year they will receive an average tax cut worth £107,000. It beggars belief that while taking from families on low incomes with one hand, the Chancellor gives to millionaires with the other—there is one rule for the very richest, another for everyone else.

[Charlie Elphicke]

The hon. Lady talks about the Government favouring the richest, but if we look at the distributional impact of tax and benefit reforms on the IFS slides to which she has referred, we can see very clearly that the richest 10% lose £260 in net income whereas everyone else is far less disadvantaged. Does she not agree that the richest are shouldering more of the burden?

[Rachel Reeves]

If the hon. Gentleman thinks that those on average incomes being worse off by £534 year is not very much, it is up to him to justify that to the people of Dover and Deal. Page 17 of the IFS analysis shows that the poorest 10% are 1.6% worse off, the second decile are 1.7% worse off, the third 1.3%, the fourth 0.6% and the top only 0.5%. The four lowest deciles—those on the lowest and modest incomes—are being hit hardest by the changes in the autumn statement, while those at the top get off relatively unscathed. That is the reality and if he wants to put that slide in his leaflets in Dover and explain it to his constituents, I am sure that they would appreciate it.

As I have said, it is one rule for the richest and another for everyone else. The poor are expected to work harder or else they will be made poorer, but apparently the rich will work harder only if they are made richer. It is the same old out-of-touch Tories and their Liberal Democrat accomplices.

There are some who think that the Chancellor is a master of political strategy; his autumn statement was clearly delicately put together. He said that borrowing was down this year, but that is only by using money from the sale of 4G contracts, which has yet to happen. He said that his cuts were targeting the workshy, when in reality they hit working people. He said that austerity was necessary for us to compete with our global competitors when, after two years of austerity, we have fallen further behind. He lived up to his reputation as a part-time Chancellor, because it was a statement that worried more about tomorrow’s headlines than the economic reality. For all of the Chancellor’s cynical political games and for all the smoke and mirrors, the real story is being felt across the country. Living standards are being squeezed, long-term unemployment is rising, borrowing is up, growth is flatlining: it is a story of a failed Chancellor and his Lib Dem accomplice desperately trying to find a way out of the mess their economic failure has got them into.

Income Tax

Debate between Rachel Reeves and Charlie Elphicke

Wednesday 28th November 2012 Commons Chamber

[Rachel Reeves]

Thank you, Mr Speaker.

The increase in the top rate of tax from 40p to 50p was introduced to help to reduce the deficit because the last Labour Government thought that it was right that those with the broadest shoulders paid a little bit more towards achieving that. The fact that this Chancellor has reversed that and is reducing the top rate of tax shows that he thinks exactly the opposite—that his priorities are not with ordinary working people but with the richest 1%. [Interruption.]

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Rachel Reeves]

I will—and if the hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness (Mr Stuart) has an intervention to make, then he can make it.

[Charlie Elphicke]

Does the hon. Lady accept the calculation by the Office for Budget Responsibility that this proposal would cost £100 million—yes or no?

[Rachel Reeves]

Let us look at what Robert Chote, the chair of the OBR, says about the cut in the 50p rate:

“This is a judgement based on not even a full year’s data based in terms of how people have responded to the 50p rate, in particular in terms of those self assessment tax-payers.”

Indeed, we know that a series of larger-than-usual dividends were paid in the days and weeks just before the introduction of the 50p rate. For example, the Prime Minister’s friend Emma Harrison, who is the Government’s adviser on their welfare-to-work programme—we know how successful that has been—was paid on 1 April 2010, before the new tax year, which meant that her dividend was taxed at the old 40% rate, saving her £800,000.

That is why the Government’s claims about the yield of the 50p rate do not stand up. People have had the opportunity to anticipate the introduction of the new taxation rate by bringing their income forward, as they did when the rate was reduced. As the Office for Budget Responsibility and the Institute for Fiscal Studies said, it is difficult to produce a definitive estimate for the long-term yield of a tax that has been in place for only a short period, and it is fiscally irresponsible and wholly misleading to use figures from the first year to justify the policy.

[Charlie Elphicke]

I thank the hon. Lady for giving way again, but let me press her a bit more on this point. The OBR said that its calculation was a “reasonable and central estimate.” Does she disagree with that?

[Rachel Reeves]

Robert Chote has said:

“This is a judgment based on not even a full year’s worth of data”

and the estimates are very uncertain. Another group of experts at the IFS stated that

“by giving out £3 billion to well-off people who pay 50p tax…the Government is banking on a very, very uncertain amount of people changing their behaviour and paying more tax as a result of the fact that you’re taxing them…There is a lot of uncertainty, a lot of risk on this estimate.”

If the Government think that lots of millionaires who were not paying the 50p rate of tax will start flooding to these shores to pay the 45p rate—well, we will see what happens when the numbers come out.

[Charlie Elphicke]

Let us talk about those millionaires. Today’s Daily Mail states that the number of millionaires slumped from 16,000 to 6,000 after the 50p rate of tax was introduced, and that revenues fell from £13.4 billion to £6.5 billion. Does that show that if the rate of tax is increased too much, it will have a negative impact on the public finances?

[Rachel Reeves]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for at least highlighting that thousands of people with declared incomes of more than £1 million who were paying the 50p rate will get a tax cut next year. His figures show that in 2010-11 there were 6,000 people with declared incomes of more than £1 million, and 10,000 in 2011-12. A written answer that I received from the Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury on 19 June stated that 70% of people earning more than £250,000 were paying more than 40% in tax, and 80% of those earning more than £500,000 were paying the 50p rate. In the new year, each and every one will get a large tax cut.

If the Government honestly want people to pay their fair share of tax, they should spend more time and resources on tackling tax avoidance, not compensate the wealthiest by cutting the headline rate of tax. No wonder they have cut staff numbers at Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs by 11%—they have just given up.

I am happy to debate the Government’s record on raising revenue through taxation. Last autumn, as a result of the slowing economy, projected income tax revenues across the board had to be written down by £51.2 billion by the Office for Budget Responsibility because of the weakness of the economy and the double-dip recession. Only last week, the Office for National Statistics released statistics showing that public borrowing in October was £2.7 billion higher than for the same month last year.

Over the first seven months of financial year 2012-13, the Government have borrowed around £5 billion more than for the same period last year. Why are we seeing that increase in borrowing? It is not as if the Government have not put up taxes for ordinary people or cut public services. The Chancellor’s flatlining economy has forced a 10% slump in corporation tax revenues, and VAT revenues are expected to be down by 2.5%. The Government can spend all the time they like defending a tax cut for millionaires, and Ministers as much time as they like in Cabinet arguing among themselves about why there has been no growth, but it is time they changed course and adopted a plan for jobs and growth.

Infrastructure (Financial Assistance) Bill

Debate between Rachel Reeves and Charlie Elphicke

Monday 17th September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Charlie Elphicke]

Can the hon. Lady clear up a bit of confusion? Today, she wrote in The Guardian that the Labour party would fix all this with a bankers bonus tax to build new affordable homes. However, it seems that this tax has been spent a number of times. Back in March, the Leader of the Opposition said it was going to be used to fund the young unemployed. Which is it?

[Rachel Reeves]

The bank bonus tax is being used to do two things: first, to create 100,000 jobs for young people; and secondly, for the construction of 25,000 new affordable homes. The Opposition believe that the priority right now is construction and getting young people back to work. The Government believe that the priority is a tax cut for the bonuses. That just shows how out of touch this coalition Government are.

Nothing better illustrates the long-term costs of this Government’s short-sighted complacency than the shocking shortfall in infrastructure investment. If we want to build a productive, competitive economy for the future, we need to invest in the road and rail systems that keep this country moving; in the energy supplies that power our industries; in the information and communication networks that turn ideas into real innovations. With study after study confirming Keynes’s original insight—that construction projects can maximise the multiplier effects of new investment, creating skilled jobs in the construction sector as well as in engineering and design—there is no better time than now.

Instead, we have had from this Government countless speeches, statements and strategy documents. People are asking, “Where is the delivery?” As the CBI is asking, where are the diggers on the ground? When are we going to start turning blueprints into bricks and mortar? It was the Prime Minister who said,

“This autumn, the government is on an all-out mission to unblock the system and get projects underway”.

That sounds promising—until we realise that he said this a year ago. Since then, what have we seen? None of the road building projects in the autumn statement package have begun construction. The number of housing starts is down on 2011. Planning applications are taking longer to approve. I agreed with the Prime Minister when he said:

“In terms of job creation today, getting construction projects off the ground is critical.”

But in the year since he told us that barely one in 10 of the projects listed in the Government’s construction pipeline have moved forward to procurement or construction, and almost as many of them have moved backwards. Total UK construction output is down by more than 10% and last week’s jobs figures showed that the number of jobs in the construction sector has fallen by 89,000, bringing the total number of construction jobs lost since this Government came to power to 120,000.

The Deputy Prime Minister has promised that support for infrastructure and other private sector projects from the regional growth fund would offer a

“boost to business, which will jump start growth and create jobs that last in the places that really need it.”

That sounds like just what we need, but that was said a year ago. We know that since then just £60 million of the promised £1.4 billion has been released to businesses, creating barely 5% of the 37,000 jobs promised.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer announced £20 billion in new infrastructure investment to be funded by the pension funds—that was a year ago. We now know that this scheme will be launched next year, with funds amounting to only a tenth of what was promised back then. As the failure of this Government’s promises increases, their rhetorical displays have become ever more strident. Two weeks ago, in response to questions from my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition, the Prime Minister said:

“If we look at what is planned by this Government, we see that between 2010 and 2015 we will be investing £250 billion in infrastructure.”—[Official Report, 5 September 2012; Vol. 549, c. 230.]

It is true that the national infrastructure plan sets out £250 billion-worth of projects— would government not be easy if you were judged only on what you had planned? If we look instead at what has been delivered, we see that the picture is rather different. The Office for National Statistics shows that new infrastructure orders since the second quarter of 2010 average less than £2 billion a quarter. At this rate, it will take not five years but more than 30 years for the Government’s grand plan to be delivered. The latest construction output figures released last week show that progress is slowing, not accelerating. It is no wonder that the director general of the British Chambers of Commerce has described the national infrastructure plan as

“hot air, a complete fiction”.

Finance (No. 4) Bill

Debate between Rachel Reeves and Charlie Elphicke

Monday 16th April 2012 Commons Chamber

[Rachel Reeves]

I believe that a temporary cut in VAT back down to 17.5% and a national insurance holiday for all small businesses taking on new workers are the way to put the economy back on track to recovery.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

How would the hon. Lady pay for those pledges, and how much they would cost?

[Rachel Reeves]

This Government are borrowing an extra £150 billion because of the costs of their economic failure. The reality is that, with more people out of work and therefore claiming benefits, and with fewer businesses succeeding and paying taxes, this Government are ending up borrowing more, because their risky gamble with their economic policies has failed.

Instead of continuing on the downward path begun under the previous Government, total unemployment has mounted to new highs. It is now at the highest level since 1997. Some 2.67 million people are out of work. More than 1 million young people are out of work. We have the highest level of youth unemployment on record. That is a cruel fate to be inflicting on people leaving school, college and university. Instead of going on to get a job or training, they are being left to rot on the dole queue. The truth is that—just as we on this side of the House, along with numerous independent economists, warned—the Government’s attempts to cut too far and too fast have choked off the economic recovery, squeezing households and businesses and sending unemployment soaring, with the result that, as I said to the hon. Member for Dover (Charlie Elphicke), the Government are now forced to borrow £150 billion more than they had planned.

This lesson is being learned around the world, as over-ambitious austerity plans founder. Last year the OECD warned credit rating agencies which press for rapid fiscal consolidation but

“react negatively later, when consolidation leads to lower growth—which it often does.”

Sure enough, Standard & Poor’s decision earlier this year to downgrade nine of the eurozone’s 17 member states was accompanied by the warning that

“fiscal austerity alone risks becoming self-defeating.”

The International Monetary Fund’s sharp downward revisions of its global growth forecasts—including for the UK—for 2012 was accompanied by a call to “reconsider the pace” of fiscal consolidation. Indeed, the IMF’s chief economist has said:

“Substantial fiscal consolidation is needed, and debt levels must decrease. But it should be…a marathon rather than a sprint”

and cited the proverb

“slow and steady wins the race”.

Our economic performance did not have to be this way. We need only look across the Atlantic to see the benefits of a more balanced approach to deficit reduction, with the US now enjoying steady falls in unemployment and accelerating economic growth. Let me quote the opinion of Adam Posen of the Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee. His forensic comparison of the US and UK experiences concluded:

“Fiscal policy…played an important role as well. Cumulatively, the UK government tightened fiscal policy by 3% more than the US government did…and this had a material impact on consumption. This was particularly the case because a large chunk of the fiscal consolidation in 2010 and in 2011 took the form of a VAT increase, which has a high multiplier for households.”

In other words, by hitting households as hard as they did, sapping confidence and sucking demand out of the economy, the Chancellor and his ready accomplice, the Chief Secretary, have got the UK stuck in the slow lane while other key players in the global economy are overtaking us.

--- Later in debate ---

[Rachel Reeves]

That is just not true and it is not accurate. A reduction in VAT helps people who do not pay income tax, which includes the poorest people, and benefits pensioners. The increase in the personal tax threshold does not benefit pensioners one jot, nor people who are not earning enough to benefit from a change in personal allowance. A cut in VAT helps all those people, however, including the lowest paid who will not benefit from the changes to the tax threshold. The right hon. Gentleman is just wrong.

[Charlie Elphicke]

The hon. Lady can correct me if I am wrong, but my reading of the IFS’s analysis is that it says that increasing the personal allowance just like that would benefit the most well-off, but it does not take into account the fact that the threshold at the 40% rate is reduced down so that the most well-off do not benefit. That is a slight flaw, by my reading, in the IFS analysis.

[Rachel Reeves]

The analysis of the measures in the Budget shows that the changes to the personal threshold are not a progressive policy, as hon. Members seem to be claiming. In fact, they benefit those dual income households on higher salaries much more than they benefit the poorest people in society, many of whom do not pay tax. Of course, the changes do not benefit pensioners at all as they are seeing their tax allowance frozen. As a result, many pensioners will lose out by up to £83 whereas people who are coming up to retirement will lose out to the tune of more than £300 a year.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer’s new economic model—this idea that we will have a rebalanced economy with lower borrowing, more saving and more investment—has failed to materialise. Indeed, the precise opposite is predicted. Their plan has failed: the policies are hurting, but they are not working. This Finance Bill, which was a chance for the Chancellor and the Chief Secretary to learn the lessons and to start to repair some of the damage that they have done, has been a huge missed opportunity.

--- Later in debate ---

[Rachel Reeves]

I thank my right hon. Friend for that intervention. She is absolutely right: instead of the Government making up policy as they go along, without bothering to talk to anybody who is affected by it, they should have consulted the Charity Commission and the charities affected. The Press Association reports that the Government are doing a U-turn; perhaps we will get clarification on that from the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, if he is bothering to listen to anything that is being said this afternoon. Will he confirm what the PA says—that there is a U-turn on charities tax relief? The fact is that nobody knows: the Government and the Prime Minister do not seem to know what is happening with their own policy, and we have had no clarification in the House this afternoon.

[Charlie Elphicke]

rose—

[Rachel Reeves]

Perhaps the hon. Gentleman has a clue what is going on with the Government’s policy on charities tax relief.

[Charlie Elphicke]

It is clear that we should crack down on tax avoidance, but I want to know whether the hon. Lady is serious about doing so. Will she condemn the tax avoidance of people such as Ken Livingstone, or is this just more crocodile tears from the Labour party?

[Rachel Reeves]

We are serious about cracking down on tax avoidance, but tax avoidance is not the same as giving donations to UNICEF, Macmillan nurses, the Red Cross, the National Trust and thousands of charities in this country that rely on the money they get to do their important work, often supporting some of the most vulnerable people in society. If the Government cannot tell the difference between tax avoidance and doing the right thing and supporting valuable charity work, it shows the extent to which they have lost their grip on reality.

Youth Unemployment and Bank Bonuses

Debate between Rachel Reeves and Charlie Elphicke

Monday 23rd January 2012 Commons Chamber

[Rachel Reeves]

In the hon. Lady’s constituency, long-term youth unemployment has gone up by 25% in the past few months. I do not know what she says to her constituents—“There’s loads of jobs out there. Just go and get one”? More people are chasing jobs than there are jobs available. That is because the Government are pushing more and more people out of work. I am sorry that the hon. Lady does not know the numbers for her constituency, but we know.

[Charlie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)]

The hon. Lady talked about the scarring effect of the fast-buck culture. Will she condemn the right hon. Member for South Shields (David Miliband) for taking a consultancy with private equity?

Taxation Freedom Day Bill

Debate between Rachel Reeves and Charlie Elphicke

Friday 25th November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Rachel Reeves]

I think my hon. Friends are where I would like to be today—in the constituency meeting constituents, rather than here. I usually try to go back to my constituency on a Thursday, as do many other MPs. Of course, the Members who are here today think that this issue is more important than doing work in their constituencies.

[Charlie Elphicke]

A few moments ago, the hon. Lady mentioned the taxation of cigarettes. Seeing my hon. Friend the Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg) in the Chamber, it is only right that I remind her that the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius said in his “Meditations”:

“Into every life a little rain must fall.”

Those of us who smoke have enough rain with the health hazard, without massive taxation on top.

[Rachel Reeves]

I am afraid I only went to a comprehensive school, so I did not study Latin. Maybe the hon. Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg) would like to do some interpretation.

The hon. Member for Kettering reminds me of my holidays when I was at school. As he knows, I used to go to Kettering in all my school holidays, because my grandparents lived there. I still have many family members in Kettering.

[Rachel Reeves]

I expect not.

I was just thinking about the lives that my grandparents led and the things that mattered to them. Every day, they benefited from what happened in both the public and private sector. They worked in the shoe factories in Kettering, as the hon. Member for Kettering knows—we have discussed it before. However, they also lived in a council house, when they were ill they used Kettering general hospital, and their children went to state schools in Kettering. My father went to Kettering grammar school.

Having a tax freedom day suggests that until that date in May, June or whenever it falls, people are contributing to someone or something else, or to the Exchequer. Actually, the money that they pay in taxes every day from the beginning of January until the end of December is used for things that matter to them, for instance building council houses such as my grandparents lived in, paying for teachers and for schools such as they went to and paying for nurses and doctors in the hospital that treated them when they were ill. It seems a little irrelevant to have a tax freedom day, because whether it is 5 February or 25 November, people need both what they pay their taxes for and disposable income to pay for things that matter to them. That is why those suggesting a tax freedom day misconstrue the situation.

[Charlie Elphicke]

The hon. Lady makes the point that public services need to be funded. Does she not recognise that tax is needed also to fund the interest on the Government’s debt, much of which was added by the previous Government? Does she share my regret that we have so much debt as a nation?

[Rachel Reeves]

The reality is that because the current Government have failed to get a grip on growth, and because unemployment is rising and inflation is higher than forecast, borrowing is now expected to be £46 billion higher over the course of this Parliament than they had previously planned. When the Office for Budget Responsibility reports next week, we are likely to see that Government borrowing will be higher still.

The point is that we cannot reduce the budget deficit just through tax increases and spending cuts. We also need economic growth, and we can see the difference between the UK’s growth rate of 0.5% over the past year and the higher rates of other countries such as the US, Canada and even Italy. We cannot reduce the deficit and get debt down unless the economy is growing again and creating jobs; otherwise, we will end up paying more out in benefits and getting less in through tax revenues. That is why the Government’s deficit reduction plans are not bearing fruit—they do not have the strategy for growth upon which all that hinges. I believe that if we want to reduce the deficit and get our constituents back to work, we need a plan for jobs and growth. Without that, borrowing will continue to get higher and tax freedom day will be a little bit later in the year.

I was looking earlier at Labour’s five-point plan for jobs and growth and wondering how much of it Conservative Members, particularly the hon. Member for Kettering, might support. The first point is a temporary reduction in VAT, which he might support because it would bring forward tax freedom day to slightly earlier in the year. I suspect that he would not support the second point, which is a £2 billion tax on bank bonuses, although most of our constituents would not be affected by it. The bank bonus tax would be used to fund 100,000 jobs for young people, which would get more people back to work and paying taxes and mean that less was being paid out in unemployment benefits. Perhaps that, too, would bring forward tax freedom day.

The third point is the introduction of long-term investment projects. That might sound like something that the hon. Gentleman would disagree with, but if it helps people to get back to work, particularly in the construction sector, perhaps Conservative Members would support it. It would get more people back to work and paying taxes. The fourth component of Labour’s five-point plan for jobs and growth is a one-year cut in VAT—to 5%—on home improvements. Perhaps Conservative Members could also support that, given that it is a tax cut. The fifth point is a one-year national insurance tax break for every small firm taking on new workers. I hope that they could support that, too, because it would help small businesses to take on more employees and get the economy moving again.

[Charlie Elphicke]

The hon. Lady mentions a long wish list but what would be the total cost in extra public spending?

[Rachel Reeves]

The Government will be borrowing more this Parliament because they are paying the costs of economic failure: they are paying the costs of having 2.62 million unemployed people, including 1.02 million unemployed young people; they are paying because growth, at 0.5% over the past year, is lower than the Office for Budget Responsibility forecast; and they are paying for the higher levels of inflation, which was 5.2% in September compared with the 4.3% that the OBR forecast, which means that we are paying out more in benefits.

The Government are borrowing £46 billion more this Parliament, and as I said earlier, that number is likely to rise next week because the Government have not done enough to get the economy moving, to get people back to work and to contain inflation. The VAT increase led directly to that increase. I accept that these policies would cost money but they would get people back into jobs, get the economy growing again and reduce the budget deficit at a more balanced pace. As Conservative Members have said in the past couple of days, it is clear that although targeted tax cuts now might mean a bit more borrowing, they would help to get the economy back on track, which would also help to reduce the budget deficit in a balanced way.

[Charlie Elphicke]

But would that extra borrowing not put at risk our interest rates? I do not know whether the hon. Lady is aware, but today the interest rates on UK gilts are lower than those on German bunds. I do not know when that last happened. The risk is that if we borrow more, interest rates will be higher, which will have vastly more negative effects on our economy than the current spending squeeze—

[Charlie Elphicke]

May I finish first, Mr Deputy Speaker? That would delay tax freedom day.

[Rachel Reeves]

It is good to know that the hon. Gentleman will talk about more than just the cost of cigarettes. The last time I looked, yields on German Government bonds and UK gilts were 2.14% and 2.16% respectively. I do not know whether that changed when he nipped out of the Chamber for a cigarette.

Market traders are looking for a deficit reduction plan, but they are also looking for economies that will grow. Economic growth is a component of reducing the debt and tackling the budget deficit. Unless we have growth, we pay out more in benefits and get in less in taxes. If we want tax freedom day to be a bit earlier in the year, we need more people in work and more businesses succeeding, which is why Labour’s five-point plan for jobs and growth is so important to getting people back to work and achieving the balanced deficit reduction that we need.

In conclusion, I do not support the Bill. It is not a good use of Government time, parliamentary time or taxpayers’ money to celebrate a tax freedom day. Our constituents would all prefer us to concentrate on the things that matter to them: jobs, growth and the squeeze on living standards. The Minister said earlier in the week that the Government were on track to meet their deficit reduction plans. It would be interesting to hear what she has to say about that today, ahead of the OBR’s numbers’ coming out next Tuesday. I believe that a policy of targeted tax cuts to help families is more in touch than the Government sticking doggedly to plan A. I thank the hon. Member for Kettering for giving us a chance to debate these issues today, and I am sorry that I am unable to support his Bill.