Oral Answers to Questions

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Tuesday 5th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

I looked at the plans that this Government inherited, and then cut petrol duty in March 2011. We have frozen the duty ever since, and I intend to continue the freeze for the rest of the current Parliament, provided that we can find the savings to pay for it. That is the crucial point: if we do not sort out the economy, if we are not fixing the public finances, if we do not have an economic plan, we cannot have a living standards plan.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

Notwithstanding the excellent news of the fuel freeze, petrol pump prices are still under threat from hard-liners at Grangemouth. Does my right hon. Friend agree that extremism in the pursuit of hard-pressed motorists is no virtue?

[Mr Osborne]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The greatest threat to fuel supplies recently has been the threat of industrial action from the Unite union, led by the chair of the Falkirk Labour party. We now hear the former Labour Chancellor and the former Labour Foreign Secretary saying that Labour should open its inquiry and publish what it finds, and a Labour Front Bencher saying that Labour does not “publish internal documents”.