Future of Financial Services

Richard Thomson Excerpts

Monday 9th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Rishi Sunak]

I am very happy to take the issue away, and I look forward to discussing it further with my hon. Friend on behalf of his constituents.

[Richard Thomson (Gordon) (SNP)]

I have to say to the Chancellor that his announcement this afternoon will do little to stem the haemorrhaging of jobs and assets that we have seen since the failure so far of his Government’s negotiations on Brexit. Earlier in the year, Germany announced a £46 billion investment in the green economy to stimulate recovery. How will the Chancellor’s sovereign green bond attempt to match that? What discussions has he had or does he intend to have with the devolved Administrations around these islands to discuss how the proceeds of any such bond issue might usefully be put to work?

[Rishi Sunak]

I point the hon. Gentleman to our Budget in March, where we set out a sense of the capital plans for the next few years. What he will see there are plans to spend more than £600 billion in capital investment in this country over the next five years, raising capital investment to the highest sustained level it has seen in almost half a century.