Oral Answers to Questions

Shaun Woodward Excerpts

Wednesday 9th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Paterson]

We regard Northern Ireland as an integral part of the United Kingdom. Northern Ireland taxpayers pay their tax and receive public spending in return.

[Mr Shaun Woodward (St Helens South and Whiston) (Lab)]

I join the Secretary of State in his tribute to Ranger Dalzell and his family.

The Secretary of State has made it clear that he wants to be Northern Ireland’s man in the Cabinet. As he knows, following the rise in VAT instituted by his Government, a litre of fuel in Northern Ireland is the most expensive in any part of the UK. Can he tell the House why it is more expensive in Belfast than in North Shropshire, and what a litre of fuel costs in Belfast this morning?

[Mr Paterson]

Prices vary from 120p to 133p for petrol or diesel, but the right hon. Gentleman should remember that it was his Government who increased the rate of duty on fuel. He was in the bunker with the great incompetent for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Mr Brown), who got the country into this mess in the first place.

[Mr Woodward]

I am glad that the Secretary of State managed to find an answer in his folder. The First Minister and Deputy First Minister are asking him urgently for help in Northern Ireland now. He has been in the job for nearly a year, but so far there has been no real help on the economy, just a promised paper on the economy that is still stuck in the printing press. Meanwhile, VAT is up, fuel prices are up and private sector business activity is reporting the biggest fall in 26 months. Hundreds are losing their jobs at Belfast Metropolitan college, 4,000 more are due to lose their jobs in health and social services and tens of thousands more jobs will go in the public sector. In Dublin, demand evaporates. Now we learn that he is losing his battle with the Chancellor for a future grab on end-of-year funding from the Executive. We can all see that it is hurting. When are people in Northern Ireland going to see it is working?

[Mr Paterson]

I do not know how the right hon. Gentleman has the nerve. When he was sitting in the bunker in Downing street shoring up his former boss, who overruled the right hon. Member for Edinburgh South West (Mr Darling) when he wanted to raise VAT, the Belfast News Letter found out that I was in Northern Ireland more than he was. We were in the danger zone in May, but thanks to the measures that we have taken, everyone in the UK, including in Northern Ireland and Lancashire, are in a better place as we establish stability in the public finances. We cannot go on spending £120 million a day on debt interest.