Finance Bill

Debate between Sammy Wilson and Jim Cunningham

Tuesday 28th June 2016 Commons Chamber

[Sammy Wilson]

The hon. Gentleman is quite right: if we look at the record of companies in the United Kingdom as corporation tax has decreased, we see that we have experienced increasing foreign direct investment. Indeed, since the Northern Ireland Government announced that corporation tax will be reduced in, we hope, a year and a half’s time, there has been an upsurge of interest in the number of companies that wish to consider Northern Ireland as an investment proposition. We are already the second most successful region in the United Kingdom for foreign direct investment—I suppose that this bears out the Opposition spokesman’s point—because we have emphasised the other selling points that are available to us at present, but corporation tax is the additional one that will make things easier for us.

[Mr Jim Cunningham]

Coming back to something that the hon. Gentleman said earlier about the training levy, for want of a better term, employers and particularly small businesses in this country have traditionally been reluctant about that levy. What do businesses in Northern Ireland feel about the levy?

[Sammy Wilson]

Of course, all businesses will seek to emphasise the additional costs that the levy imposes on them. However, many businesses that face a shortage skills in Northern Ireland now recognise that there must be a means to ensure that we have a supply of skilled labour. Opinions differ on how to provide that supply of skilled labour and how the apprenticeship levy should be applied and used, but people now accept, given the importance of skilled labour to firms, that they have to pay for it.

EU Referendum: Timing

Debate between Sammy Wilson and Jim Cunningham

Tuesday 9th February 2016 Commons Chamber

[Sammy Wilson]

That is another important point that has not been raised before. It is one of a number of essential points that need to be considered.

Another argument I have heard is that people will get bored. When people are thinking about their long-term future and they vote, should their vote actually mean something or should they vote for people who come to this institution but then find that their views are overridden by bureaucrats in Brussels or by judges in the European Court? That, to me, is a fundamental issue. Given the impact that the European Union has had on the lives of so many people throughout the United Kingdom, I cannot imagine that they will be bored by the debate. I have addressed a few campaign meetings. I spoke at a Grassroots Out meeting not long ago, and the one thing I noticed about that audience was that they were not bored by politics in general, or by the politics of discussing the European Union. They were raring to go: they wanted to get into the campaign. I believe that this “boredom factor” is another straw man.

[Mr Jim Cunningham]

Anyone who took part in the Scottish referendum knows that this referendum will not be boring. I was involved in the 1975 referendum, and that was not boring. In fact, this referendum will generate a great deal of heat. I think that the real reason the Government are rushing it is the problem that they have with their right wing, which will try to sabotage it.

[Sammy Wilson]

I think the hon. Gentleman is right. The campaign will not be boring, and nor will the issues, because they are so fundamental to people’s lives.

Another argument that has been advanced, notably by the hon. Member for North West Durham (Pat Glass), is that the longer the campaign goes on, the more destabilising it will be for the United Kingdom and its economy. That was the Labour party’s argument for not having a referendum in the first place. It did not apply then, and it does not apply now. It was significant that the hon. Lady could not even give any examples of investors fleeing the United Kingdom or withholding investment from the United Kingdom, or of jobs moving out of the United Kingdom, simply because of the prospect of a referendum on our membership of Europe.

This is an important issue, and one that should be given full consideration. It should not be squeezed as it has been. I have not even touched on the issue of designation, but the Minister indicated that even that might be squeezed, which would cause further suspicion in people’s minds. We need to have a positive debate. The right hon. Member for Gordon spoke of the benefits of membership, and of his wish to extol them to the people. I want an opportunity to extol to the people of Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom the great life that we can have outside the EU: the great life that we can have when the chains are off our arms and off our economy, when we can decide how we can spend our own money, decide who we let into our country and who we keep out, decide what laws we want and how they are applied, and decide how we trade with other parts of the world.

That is the positive debate that I want to have, and I want it to continue throughout June, July, August and September. It will not be boring, and it will give the people of the United Kingdom, including the people of Northern Ireland, an opportunity to make their decision on the basis of the facts, not on the basis of the scare stories, and not on the basis of a compressed campaign that the Government hope can take place quickly so that only their side of the argument is heard.

English Votes for English Laws

Debate between Sammy Wilson and Jim Cunningham

Wednesday 15th July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Sammy Wilson]

If that is the case, and if all that the hon. Gentleman’s constituents want is a simple resolution of the issue, surely the best way to achieve that without unnecessarily fanning the flames of nationalism is to do exactly what the Opposition spokesperson said and take an approach that will lead us to consensus.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

One of the reasons I think the Government are playing games with this and trying to rush it through is that the UK Independence party is driving them forward, but we have not seen that yet.