Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Rehman Chishti and Danny Alexander

Tuesday 11th September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Rehman Chishti (Gillingham and Rainham) (Con)]

6. What steps he has taken to help households with their cost of living.

[The Chief Secretary to the Treasury (Danny Alexander)]

The Government have taken wide-ranging action to support households. For example, we cut fuel duty last year and have deferred various increases planned by the Labour party. We are also helping those in work by raising the personal allowance by £1,100 in April next year, which is the largest cut in income tax for median earners in more than a decade. That is a substantial record of dealing with the big questions in the cost of living for families.

[Rehman Chishti]

I thank my right hon. Friend for that answer. There are concerns that fuel companies delay the reduction in petrol prices when the cost of crude oil falls. What action are the Government taking to ensure that companies pass on savings to motorists?

[Danny Alexander]

The hon. Gentleman raises an important point, and I sympathise greatly with families up and down the country who face the problem that he describes. That is why we have made decisions on fuel duty that mean that the price of petrol is roughly 10p a litre less than it would have been had we followed through the Labour party’s plans. The Office of Fair Trading has recently announced a call for information on the problem, and I urge him and Members in all parts of the House to pass on any information that they have. Having spoken to Clive Maxwell of the OFT, I know that it is committed to ensuring—

Youth Unemployment and Bank Bonuses

Debate between Rehman Chishti and Danny Alexander

Monday 23rd January 2012 Commons Chamber

[Danny Alexander]

I am doing no such thing, because those announcements will be made in due course. I have said that bonuses in the banks that we own will have to be far lower than they were last year. The cash element of bonuses will be limited to £2,000 for all employees, but of course there are other parts to bonuses, too.

Returning our country to prosperity has been the founding purpose of the coalition Government, but in our determination to restore growth, we will put fairness at the very heart of our recovery, tackling gross inequity in senior pay and tackling the perils of youth unemployment to ensure that young people’s prospects are not blighted in the way that those of too many were in the 1980s.

[Rehman Chishti (Gillingham and Rainham) (Con)]

Will the Chief Secretary give way?

[Danny Alexander]

No, I am going to make some progress now.

A fair and sustainable recovery demands leadership, and that is exactly what we are providing. Labour cannot be taken seriously on the economy until it admits the mistakes it made when it was in power. If Labour was really changing its position on the economy, the first thing it would do is say sorry. Sorry for letting youth unemployment get out of control, sorry for letting the banking sector get out of control, and sorry for letting the deficit and debt get out of—[Interruption.]

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Rehman Chishti and Danny Alexander

Tuesday 8th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Chief Secretary to the Treasury (Danny Alexander)]

The structural deficit was 8.8% of GDP in 2009-10. The Office for Budget Responsibility forecast is for it to be 7.6% in 2010-11, falling to 0.3% by 2015-16. More information is in the OBR’s forecast.

[Rehman Chishti]

OECD figures in November show that Britain entered the financial crisis with the largest structural budget deficit in the G7. Does the Chief Secretary believe that this country entered the crisis led by the biggest deficit deniers in the G7?

[Danny Alexander]

That is a very good question. The previous Government were running a structural deficit from 2001-02, with a structural deficit of 2.6% in 2007-08, the largest, as the hon. Gentleman says, in the G7 in 2007. They were deficit deniers then, they are deficit deniers now, and that is why they have no answers to the problems of our country today.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Rehman Chishti and Danny Alexander

Tuesday 21st December 2010 Commons Chamber

[The Chief Secretary to the Treasury (Danny Alexander)]

In the spending review the Government abolished the private finance initiative credit system, which provided Departments with a ring-fenced budget that could be used only to support local authority PFI projects. The change levelled the playing field between PFI and other forms of procurement.

[Rehman Chishti]

What does the Chief Secretary think of the comments made by the former Paymaster General, who said that PFI contracts were far too generous and too expensive?

[Danny Alexander]

That has a striking comment, coming from a Minister who was in the Department responsible for those things, and it reflects the general attitude towards public money that was prevalent under the previous Administration. There is a great deal of work that we can do as a Government to ensure that in future PFI is used only where it is absolutely necessary, and that we get best value for public money. That is how we should approach these things.