Oral Answers to Questions
Simon Hughes Excerpts(12 years, 6 months ago)
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Danny Alexander
I certainly join the hon. Lady in welcoming that. It will provide significant new opportunities for young people in her constituency. Of course it is part of the increase of 250,000 apprenticeships that this Government have put in place.
Simon Hughes (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (LD)
After this morning’s encouraging news, does my right hon. Friend accept that one way of maximising employment is to give people the right to have flexible employment if that is what they wish? Given that the coalition agreement pledged to give people the right to request flexible employment, can he report on progress in implementing that commitment?
Danny Alexander
My right hon. Friend is correct, and it is a great shame that Labour Members sneer at the economic growth that has been reported today. As my right hon. Friend says, flexible employment is an important part of that growth. We set out plans in our coalition agreement, and we have announced proposals to implement them by the end of the current Parliament.
Comprehensive Spending Review
Simon Hughes Excerpts(13 years, 7 months ago)
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Mr Osborne
We have had to take some difficult decisions on housing benefit, but I think they are fair and we have sought to protect the most vulnerable. Of course, the universal credit we are introducing means that it will always pay to work—that is the basic principle and housing benefit is part of it. The Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government will set out the reforms in detail. The principles are set out in the document, which the hon. Gentleman can look at. As I said, existing social tenants will be protected through their rent agreements.
Simon Hughes (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (LD)
The Government have rightly taken decisions to deal with the deficit left by the international recession, the banks and the outgoing Labour Government. Can the Chancellor confirm that the policy behind the statement is not just that those with the broadest shoulders should carry the biggest burden, but that as well as children, pensioners and households on the lowest incomes will be protected most, which will be supported by the assessment of the impact of the Budget and the statement he has made and presented today?
Mr Osborne
The poorest suffer when a country loses control of its public finances. That, indeed, was the assessment of the right hon. Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Mr Brown), and it was one of the few things he said that I agreed with. Constituents on the lowest incomes benefit from a Government trying to deal with this economic problem. The structural deficit—someone asked me about it—is the bit that does not go away when the economy grows. Labour Members seem to be suggesting that in four years’ time, a Chancellor of the Exchequer will stand up to announce the next four-year programme of cuts, which would not do this country much good.
Specifically on pensioners, we have of course taken the big decision to link the basic state pension to earnings, and we have protected the pension credit. Yes, there have been some difficult decisions on welfare, but I have sought to protect the most vulnerable, and I believe that our overall welfare reforms will help to provide incentives to many in our country who do not currently have them to seek employment.
Finance Bill
Simon Hughes Excerpts(13 years, 10 months ago)
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Simon Hughes (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (LD)
Does the right hon. Gentleman accept that his attacks might just begin to be credible if Labour’s record were not so dreadful? Inequality increased, the link between earnings and pensions was never delivered, child poverty was not reduced over the whole period of the Labour Government, fuel poverty increased and poor people on low incomes were not taken out of tax. Where is the credibility in that? This Budget will clearly deliver a fairer outcome than the one that his Government left us with.
Mr Byrne
I was empathising with the hon. Gentleman until his final sentence. As he will know, over the past 10 to 15 years up to 2006, just four countries out of the entire 20 or 30 members of the OECD succeeded in reversing inequality. They were Turkey, Ireland, Mexico and the United Kingdom. The attack on inequality was always a central mission for the Labour Government. Yes, of course we wanted to go further, but we were proud of our record of lifting 900,000 pensioners and 500,000 children out of poverty, of legislating to restore the earnings link and of introducing innovations such as tax credits. In constituencies like mine—and, I suggest, the hon. Gentleman’s—which suffer from a high rate of unemployment, that help is beginning to make a difference. That is why we are so passionate in our objection to the attack on the poorest people in this country contained in this Budget.
Simon Hughes
I respect the right hon. Gentleman for his constituency commitment to dealing with the poor. Over the period of the Labour Government—during which not everything was done wrongly—the greatest failure of all was that inequality was not reduced over the entire 13 years; in fact, it increased. The rich became richer, the very rich became very much richer, and the people at the bottom—pensioners in particular—did not have the protection from a Labour Government that history suggests they could have expected.
Mr Byrne
I look forward to the hon. Gentleman telling us later how the increase in VAT is going to support the argument that he is trying to prosecute. I hope that he will also reflect on the cost of this Budget to jobs. The official figures for job cuts as a result of this Budget are bad enough, but the real figures are even worse. We have already watched the extraordinary spectacle of the Office for Budget Responsibility tell the Chancellor that employment will be 100,000 lower as a result of Budget measures, but then the real figures were published in The Guardian—not in this House, but in The Guardian—from which we learned that secret Treasury papers say that the Budget will cost 1.3 million jobs over the next five years. When the Chancellor stood at that Dispatch Box a couple of weeks ago, he told us that he would not hide things in the “small print” and that he would give it to us “straight”; he was so straight and so open that he kept the Treasury advice out of the Budget altogether. Yet even that picture might not reflect the entirety of the Budget’s impact.
Mr Byrne
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Some Front-Bench Labour Members believe in redemption, and we have not given up on the hon. Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Simon Hughes). That is why we are looking forward so much to hearing his contribution later this evening. [Interruption.] I hope he is not going to dispel the image I have of his virtue and integrity.
Mr Deputy Speaker
Order. I hope that we can stick to the Bill. We are getting carried off in many directions, and I am sure that hon. Members will not want to do that.
Simon Hughes
May I say to the right hon. Gentleman and the hon. Member for Chesterfield (Toby Perkins) that the four major proposals on tax, finance and equality with which we went into the election have been delivered in the Budget? The only one that was not delivered was value added tax. The right hon. Gentleman knows that there is concern about its increase, but he has heard me say that I believe that, in the event, rather than making further spending cuts, it was the least worst option.
Mr Byrne
I will cling on to my image of the hon. Gentleman’s integrity and await his contribution a little later. I remain convinced that, for him, redemption is still possible.
I was about to say in response to my hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield (Toby Perkins) that the reality is that the impact on jobs might be even worse than we saw in the Red Book, or even worse than we read about in The Guardian, because the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development tells us that it forecasts that unemployment could continue to rise up towards 3 million.
This Finance Bill hits growth so hard—this is a point that I hope the hon. Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark in particular will reflect on—that, buried in the back of the Red Book, we learn that the Chancellor has had to raise £9 billion of extra taxes to pay for the lost growth. That is not cutting public debt, but adding to it—in pounds and pence and in the unquantifiable misery of wasted human lives. It is, I am afraid, a philosophy that is all too familiar. It is a distant echo of 1992, when a Tory Chancellor told us that unemployment was “a price worth paying”. Back in 1989, another Tory Chancellor, the now noble Lord Major—
Lorely Burt
The hon. Gentleman asked me about the regionalisation of corporation tax, but these are UK taxes so it is inappropriate to regionalise. He makes an interesting point that I have not considered before, but I am sure that my hon. Friends will take an interest in the idea if it has merit.
Simon Hughes
My hon. Friend is right. I just wish to say to the hon. Member for Carmarthen East and Dinefwr (Jonathan Edwards) that, as he knows, my party has been supportive of increasing autonomy and self-government in Scotland and in Wales. That has happened in Scotland and it is on the agenda for Wales, and he knows—[Interruption.] It is on the agenda for Wales; it is not agreed and it is not committed, but it is under discussion in relation to Wales. He knows that my party has always been positive towards the idea of allowing greater self-government, both in Scotland and in Wales, but that is different from the regionalisation of UK taxes such as corporation tax.
Mr Kevan Jones
On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. Is it in order that the Liberal Democrats should now have two Front-Bench spokespeople on the Treasury? Is it completely out of order for the hon. Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Simon Hughes) to be rescuing and answering on behalf of his party?
Helen Jones
In a moment—I will make a little progress first.
Something interesting is happening on the Government Benches. We used to hear from the Con bit of the Con-Dem alliance simple, open hostility to the public sector and the welfare state. Now, most of them are becoming a little more sophisticated and wrapping it up a little better. The Chancellor says constantly, “The things I’m having to do are dreadful. I don’t really want to make these cuts. However, if I could cut benefits more, it wouldn’t be so bad.” It is an interesting exercise in shifting the blame. The implication is that responsibility lies not with the Government’s decisions, but with those in receipt of benefits.
Helen Jones
My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and I shall talk about the effect after giving way to the hon. Gentleman.
Simon Hughes
I did not want to lose the hon. Lady’s point about jobs. She is being neither entirely fair nor entirely accurate. If she reads the Office for Budget Responsibility report at the back of the Red Book—the independent assessment—she will see it clearly stated on page 82 that
“the more rapid increase in employment is sufficient to lower unemployment, so that the ILO unemployment rate falls to 6 per cent in 2015. Claimant count unemployment continues to fall throughout the forecast period.”
The projection—not Government or party political—is that over that period unemployment will go down and employment will go up.
Helen Jones
If the hon. Gentleman is so confident about that, perhaps he will get his right hon. Friend the Chancellor to publish the Treasury forecasts that he is currently failing to publish. The OBR figures are based on forecasts of growth that I do not believe we will achieve because, to be frank, those forecasts have never been achieved in 40 years.
Helen Jones
My hon. Friend is right. The Bill goes with the destruction of the regional development agencies, which were vital to regions such as mine. As my hon. Friend the Member for Halton (Derek Twigg) said earlier, it goes with huge cuts in programmes such as Building Schools for the Future, which were vital to the construction industry in our area.
Simon Hughes
As one of the three MPs representing the borough of Del Boy, may I say to the hon. Lady that we on these Benches are clear that the bankers’ bonuses need to be curbed and reduced further and we will continue to press for that? The people who contributed hugely to our present troubles should pay the price to a much greater extent than anybody else.
Helen Jones
I am grateful to hon. Gentleman for intervening, because I want to say to him that his party is in government. If the Liberal Democrats want to do something about that, they can, but they have singularly failed to do so.
Let us consider the people who are paying the price of this Finance Bill—those who will be affected by the rise in VAT and who are already being hit by the cuts announced by the Government in their Budget. The Chancellor talks a lot about those on benefits. The implication, unstated but always there, is that they are all scroungers. Nothing could be further from the truth. Most people who will be hit by the cuts that he has announced are from hard-working families on low incomes. He has already announced that those on family incomes of a little more than £15,000 will see their tax credits cut. By 2012-13, anyone with a family income of more than £30,000—£15,000 each—will lose their tax credits. Child benefit has been frozen, which is an effective cut of £116 a year, but those people will have to pay the VAT increase that the Government have imposed on their spending.
Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation
Simon Hughes Excerpts(13 years, 11 months ago)
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Simon Hughes (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (LD)
I am happy to take part in what is clearly an important debate, in which we are invoking the spirits of forebears of mine, of ours, whom I pray in aid as part of the traditions to which I belong. Lloyd George, Keynes and Beveridge are indeed part of the family of progressive liberals, of whom I regard myself as a modest inheritor.
The most important thing that was announced in the area of energy and climate change and environmental policy, the specific theme of today’s debate, was the green investment bank. It had been a Labour party commitment, and the Conservative party and Liberal Democrats were clear that it should be invented, created and got up and running. It is absolutely central to this Parliament’s strategy that we set up that bank in the near future. It must not be a modest little invention hidden away in a corner; it must be a central part of the new stage of the British economy and it must draw on money from the private sector, which will be used for projects that would not otherwise be funded. But it must also help us to invest in the new generation of green jobs that will make us again the country that can export our manufacturing abilities and the success of the world. For the last 25 years, we have slipped back in manufacturing and exports in these areas and have relied too much on the City, on finance and on banking. That is not enough to sustain a modern economy, and it is not enough to change the environmental way in which we do our business and honour our international obligations.
The second specific area that was much discussed when I shadowed the right hon. Member for Doncaster North (Edward Miliband) and my neighbour the right hon. Member for Lewisham, Deptford (Joan Ruddock) was how to ensure that households and individuals play their part. The Labour party started that process and I pay credit to the right hon. Lady and her right hon. Friend for beginning to ensure that we make households energy efficient, reduce bills, insulate homes properly, protect the vulnerable, and so on. But the scheme was never big enough; it was always a set of schemes that were confusing and lacking in coherence. The phrase “Green Deal” comes from the Conservative manifesto, but the idea comes from both manifestos. That we have a green deal for households must also be a central part of the Government’s strategy. We need to ensure that the new housing that is built and the housing that needs to be renovated and improved give us the safe, warm and pleasant housing that we need. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State knows as well as anybody else, because he was the architect of the policy in our party a mere three years ago for a carbon neutral Britain, that the crucial area here is to ensure that the poor and the vulnerable are protected first, and that the people who spend a huge amount of their money on fuel when they cannot afford it are given the help that they need. One of the criticisms that I must repeat of the Labour Government, which I made when they were in office, is that when it came to helping the fuel poor—those who pay more than 10p in the pound of their income on fuel—they sadly failed. They tried, and I do not doubt their integrity in trying, but they failed, and we have to do better than that. We have to ensure that single people on their own, who make up 40% of households, and those with families do not have the ridiculous, out-of-control bills that they had; that we save the fuel and reduce the energy that we need as a country; and that we reduce our climate change liability.
Dr Whitehead
Does the hon. Gentleman agree that, if a programme such as that which he envisages is to have any real traction, there is an absolute imperative to defend and increase the almost £200 million that was set aside for the insulation of hard-to-treat homes and social housing? Will he put that in his book as a red line on Government investment in the energy efficiency uprating of social housing? If that investment does not appear, will he publicly underline his opposition to energy efficiency improvement methods that are not underwritten properly by Government funding?
Simon Hughes
The hon. Gentleman has a good, honourable and knowledgeable track record on the issue, and, as he would expect, in this Parliament I have already met the Housing Minister, the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government and my friend the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills to ensure that those points are made. We are just beginning the debate about where the spending cuts must be made, and a coalition of Members needs to put the case for retaining that expenditure which is necessary to pump-prime, drive and incentivise the housing stock change that we clearly need. The other central point, on which the Government have made a commitment, is to introduce the power of general competence to local councils, so that they have much more flexibility over how they address such issues.
Thirdly, on the green agenda, I note the comments that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change made about the carbon price, and we await with interest the publication of the proposals to reform the climate change levy. However, I remind him that we ought to reconsider introducing the emissions performance standard, which both our parties were willing to do. Labour resisted it, but I hope that it gets back on the agenda as a way of ensuring that we make progress not just in our country, but throughout Europe.
Fourthly, and more controversially, there is nuclear power, to which the Budget referred not specifically, but indirectly in relation to Sheffield Forgemasters. I made my position clear about nuclear power before the election, and when the initial announcement was made about the Sheffield Forgemasters loan, and I have always believed that the nuclear industry will not have a viable future unless it receives public subsidy. I have never had a theological opposition to nuclear power. I believed that it was the wrong answer, contributing too little to emissions reduction and to the country’s power needs, but in that context the Sheffield Forgemasters loan was inconsistent with a policy of not subsidising the nuclear power industry.
The announcement is difficult for Sheffield and for south Yorkshire, but we have to have a policy that applies from the beginning to the end, and we have to be tough on that. In reality, other countries such as Germany have now introduced a tax on nuclear power stations to make up for the fact that the industry benefits from a carbon price but does not pay for the clean-up of the legacy nuclear waste. There must be economic realism in the nuclear industry. That has been our position, and it has been accommodated in our parties’ agreement.
There is another matter on which I have lobbied the Government but not yet seen anything emerge, and if it could be dealt with in the ministerial winding-up speech that would be helpful. It is about helping with biodiesel that is made from recycled vegetable oil. I declare two interests: I drive a vehicle that uses it; and there is a firm in my constituency from which I purchase it, and which in turn takes it from firms locally. It is a good and environmental product, but the financial incentives for biofuels do not yet encourage the industry to grow. It is an industry of small businesses, it ought to be incentivised but the Treasury loses out because of the wrong incentives as well as inadequate incentives for the sector. I hope that that issue will be looked at, and that we might introduce an amendment to the Finance Bill in order to pick up on that individual and ring-fenced item.
On the Budget as a whole, the right hon. Member for Doncaster North rightly said that I had always assumed that the more natural coalition, had it been achievable, would have been between the Labour party and ourselves. There is no secret about that, but in the end it proved undeliverable on two counts: first, the numbers did not add up, and this country needed a secure, majority Government; and, secondly, the Labour party was not willing to move on key issues. They included political and electoral reform and a fairer taxation system—in particular, taking people on low incomes out of tax.
The measures that commend the Budget are specifically items that were in the Liberal Democrat manifesto, on which I did fight the election. They include, first, linking pensions with earnings. The link was broken by Mrs Thatcher and never reintroduced by Labour, but its restoration next year was committed to in this Budget. Secondly, there is the measure on taking people who have an income of less than £10,000 out of tax gradually, the first wave of which was introduced in the Budget, and which matters not to the absolutely poorest who have no incomes, but specifically to pensioners and working people who have a small income. Thirdly, there is the measure on increasing capital gains tax, because we believe that it should be set at the same level as income tax. There has been a debate among Government Members on that issue, and there is a difference in view, but there has been a move in that direction, which I applaud and recognise.
Toby Perkins
I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on his appointment as the deputy leader of the Liberal Democrats, but I fear it strangely apposite that at the moment he sits all alone on the Liberal Democrat Benches. If he feels that this is a coalition Budget, will he explain how much worse it would have been for the poorest people without the influence of the Liberal Democrats?
Simon Hughes
I am, and always have been, very clear about that issue. When it was obvious that there was no possibility of a coalition with the Labour party, we had the option either of letting the Conservatives become a minority Government or of being in coalition with them. I am very clear that it was better for the country and for the issues that matter to me that we were part of the Government—that we were influencing matters and ensuring that there was a shared programme, not a Conservative programme. I say that completely honestly, and the hon. Gentleman, with a constituency that is in some ways not dissimilar to mine, would expect as much. I have made it my business to battle for the people whom I represent in order to ensure that we end up with a fairer Budget, and a fairer Britain as the outcome. The election, the Budget and the next exercise, the spending cuts, must all be judged on whether we end up with a fairer Britain.
Let me therefore address the remaining issues that follow from that. There has been some press speculation that, because certain items are expensive, they are unaffordable and should be dropped. They include items for the poor, such as the freedom pass and the winter fuel allowance. There is no issue between me and my friends on the Treasury Bench, but the coalition deal is a deal and what has been agreed must stand. There cannot be any unpicking of items in that deal, otherwise the whole thing risks falling apart. There is no suggestion of that from the Government; there is a suggestion from outside the Chamber of changes. However, the deal must be that we go down the committed road. We signed up and the Conservative party signed up, all compromising where appropriate, and that must stand. If there were any suggestion that it change, there would be trouble. I do not think that it will change, because I have heard nothing from colleagues in government suggesting that they want it to, but let us be clear from the beginning: it is a deal, and if it is stuck to, it will last the five years.
I turn to yesterday’s Institute for Fiscal Studies report. The IFS is a respected organisation. It made clear that the Budget as a whole increases fairness, but that if it excluded the matters that were implemented by the Labour Government in the Budget earlier this year it would not be. However, the Budget does not exclude them; it has endorsed and continued them. The right hon. Member for Doncaster North and I know each other well, but the Government have continued with those elements that the previous Labour Chancellor introduced in the routine Budget earlier this year.
Simon Hughes
No, we are not taking credit for it—we are just making sure that we look together at the measures that this country has as its tax regime in the coming days and months.
On that basis, this is a Budget that produces greater fairness. There is difficulty in reaching the people at the very bottom end of the income scale who are not in work, and there are other difficult areas. However, my right hon. Friend the Chief Secretary and my hon. Friend the Member for Thornbury and Yate (Steve Webb), the Pensions Minister, who come from a proud tradition of knowing these issues well and campaigning for the poor and the disadvantaged, would not have signed up to something that undermines all the sorts of campaigns that they have been fighting for.
There remains the issue of VAT. I did not want a Budget with a VAT increase, nor did the Conservative party, and nor did the Labour party. I have no idea what was the view of some people in the Tory party behind the scenes, but there was a rumour that they would think it was a good thing. That is why, during the election campaign, we said that we thought it was a bad thing and challenged them to agree with us. Nevertheless, none of us ruled it out. I wish it were not here, as it is clearly less progressive than other taxes where people pay on the basis of income, but it is a necessary measure given that we have to fill the huge debt that the Labour party has left us.
We will vote for the Budget next week. However, if there are measures in the Finance Bill whereby we can improve fairness and make for a fairer Britain, then we will table amendments to try to do that. That is where we can make the difference, as we will during the spending review that will follow in the months ahead.
Toby Perkins
Yes, as the shadow Chancellor made clear, we would have maintained spending over the course of this year and put in place a different Budget from that of the Conservatives, along with headline measures about what future spending would be. Of course it was too early for us to have a comprehensive spending review; when the Conservatives were in opposition, did they ever do a comprehensive spending review and tell us every line of the Budget they would have carried out? Of course not. That is the reality of the situation.
My hon. Friends have pointed out that under the former Prime Minister the Labour Government led the rest of the world to the solution when the global economic crisis was at its worst. Labour made the choice to protect jobs, as I said. Just as Labour made a choice—an ethical and a political choice as well as an economic one—so the Chancellor has made his choice with the Budget. He did not choose fairness; he chose to gamble. His gamble is based on an ideology that says that the growth of the public sector somehow constricts the private sector, but it is utterly fallacious to suggest that the success of the one has to be to the detriment of the other and that the role of Government is to keep taxes low for businesses and keep out of the way. That is the wrong choice. That is taking a gamble with the recovery that Labour was delivering in a stable and managed way. It threatens our recovery at a time when the economy is still fragile.
The choice to increase VAT is, of course, regressive. When even the TaxPayers Alliance denigrates the policy as hitting the poor, we really have to listen. This will take approximately twice the amount from the incomes of the bottom 20% as it does from the top 20%, and it will stunt growth. That is acknowledged on page 97 of the Red Book, so the Chancellor is introducing a policy that he knows will stunt growth. As a business owner myself, I know that this tax will directly remove 2.5% from the bottom line of my firm if it were not passed on to my customers.
I also know that cuts in corporation tax are not as important as having a market in which one can make a profit. While the VAT cut introduced by Labour in 2008-09 stimulated growth, this VAT increase will take about £300 out of the average family’s pocket at a time when families are crying out for more help from Government, not less. That will have a knock-on effect on business. The Government seem to think that reducing the corporation tax burden, already historically low on businesses, will stimulate growth, without recognising that the environment in which businesses trade is the most important part of making a profit.
Taking money out of the pockets of consumers also takes money out of the pockets of businesses. It increases redundancies and business failures, and it stunts our ability to grow our way out of recession. For the hundreds of extra businesses that will now struggle to stay afloat, the thought of a cut in corporation tax will merit little more than a mirthless laugh. At every level, the Budget stunts growth. Cutting the allowances on which manufacturing firms were relying, and replacing them with a corporation tax cut over the next few years, will result in businesses being less likely to invest and more likely to focus on bottom-line profits.
The starkest aspect of the Budget, however, was a complete lack of a sense that the Liberal Democrats have been a moderating influence on the Tory plans. Where were the Lib Dem influences in this Budget? Seriously, does anyone in the House believe that if the Budget had been delivered by a Tory majority Administration, the Liberal Democrats would have marched through the Lobby and supported it? I will take that as a no. Where was the £2 billion capital gains tax increase? It was less than halved. Where was the commitment to restrict tax relief on pensioners to the basic rate? It disappeared. Where was the mansion tax? It does not exist. Where were the green taxes? How can one justify a £2 billion bank levy that will be compensated by corporation tax cuts for the banks that caused so much damage? Where was the Robin Hood tax on bank transactions, which would have brought in more than treble the amount?
Toby Perkins
I am afraid that I do not have time.
This was a Tory Budget without a shred of Lib Demery about it. I will applaud the hon. Member for Colchester (Bob Russell) if he sticks to his guns and refuses to vote for it. The Chancellor had a choice: he made the wrong choice, and we will all pay a heavy price for years to come.
Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation
Simon Hughes Excerpts(13 years, 11 months ago)
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Ms Harriet Harman (Camberwell and Peckham) (Lab)
The Chancellor of the Exchequer has delivered his Budget. It is his first Budget, but we have seen it all before. This is a Tory Budget that will throw people out of work, will hold back economic growth—[Interruption.] Read the book! This Budget will hold back economic growth, and will harm vital public services. Yes, it is the Chancellor’s first Budget, but it is the same old Tories, hitting hardest at those who can least afford it and breaking their promises. This is true to form for the Tories, but it includes things that the Liberal Democrats have always fought against. Surely they cannot vote for this.
The Chancellor says his top priority is to cut the deficit. In order to get the deficit down, we need to keep economic growth up and we need to keep unemployment down. Today’s Budget—[Interruption.] Read the book! Today’s Budget is bad for growth, and that will make it harder to cut the deficit.
The new Office for Budget Responsibility has said in its report today that because of this Budget, growth next year will be lower than it would have been under our policies to support the economy through difficult times. It has revised growth for next year down from 2.6% to 2.3% because of the harm that the Chancellor’s Budget does. He said he was going to tell it straight, but the Chancellor has not told it straight today on jobs. Today’s Budget is bad for jobs and that, too, will make it harder to cut the deficit. The OBR forecasts on page 84 of its report that the price of the plans he has set out today in his Budget is tens of thousands of people out of work. [Interruption.] I say to hon. Members, look at the OBR report last week and compare it, on the International Labour Organisation unemployment and claimant count, with the forecast as a result of this Budget: tens of thousands more people out of work, and unemployment higher next year and every year of this Parliament. For people affected, this is a high price to pay, and it is equivalent in scale to putting every working man and woman in the city of Coventry out of work; that is the scale of the changes on jobs. And it is counter-productive. Private sector jobs will not spontaneously emerge as we see fewer people employed in public services. This Budget will hit private sector jobs as well as public sector jobs.
The reality is we do not get borrowing down by pulling the plug on support for businesses. We do not get borrowing down by throwing people out of work and on to the dole. [Interruption.] Look at the forecasts! We do not get borrowing down by stifling economic growth. This reckless Budget’s short-sighted approach will jeopardise the recovery and make the deficit worse, and when we do that, we end up with more tax rises further down the track, and it is unfair.
It is unfair on young people who need help to get work and get a decent start in life. The Government have scrapped the future jobs fund before it has even been formally evaluated, but every young person helped into work shows its value. It is unfair on the regions, whose manufacturing industries will suffer. They have cancelled the loan to Sheffield Forgemasters; they have snatched away the chance of new jobs. It is unfair on families: cuts to the value of child benefit; cuts to the disability living allowance; cuts to help for the jobless; ending the health in pregnancy grant; cutting the Sure Start maternity grant; ending free swimming; and cutting back free school meals. It is also unfair to older people, who will have to pay higher VAT and will have less money to spend in their local shops.
The Chancellor tells us that his plans are fair: that the rich will pay most. That is not true. As the Prime Minister himself said of VAT:
“it’s very regressive, it hits the poorest the hardest. It does, I absolutely promise you”,
and as the hon. Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Simon Hughes) rightly pointed out last week, VAT “penalises the poor”.
It is unfair when cuts in public spending hit those people and those areas where public services and benefits matter most. The impact of the Chancellor’s changes to benefits and tax will be greatest in the poorest areas. We agree that borrowing must be brought down, but look at whom he has chosen to bear the brunt of cutting the deficit. The area most affected by his austerity policy, where people will see the biggest fall in average incomes, is Merseyside; the area least affected by his austerity policy—least affected by the fall in income—will be Cheshire. Yes, that includes his own constituency. This is not a fair Budget; it will entrench unfairness for the future.
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)
Please wait until after the right hon. and learned Lady has spoken.
Malcolm Bruce
I am sorry but that intervention also shows no recognition of the fact that we have to find the money from somewhere. Our approach to that gives the poorest the most and makes the richest pay the biggest contribution. I cannot think of anything more progressive than that, and the more the hon. Gentleman and others consider the Budget, the more they will recognise that it stands up to robust analysis.
I had the honour of being my party’s Treasury spokesman between 1995 and 2000. During the 1997 election, the Liberal Democrat manifesto included an aspiration to raise the threshold at which people started to pay income tax to £10,000. That was only an aspiration because, try as we might, we were unable to find the resources at that time to pay for it. However, when the Labour Government were elected in 1997, the first thing that they did was to introduce the most generous capital gains tax relief that the richest people in this country had ever enjoyed—Mrs Thatcher never contemplated it! However, closing such tax loopholes has enabled us to start to deliver the increase in the tax threshold so that people will not have to pay tax and then apply for benefit, as the Chancellor said. I for one am absolutely delighted to support a Budget that fulfils a commitment set out in an aspiration on which I fought the 1997 election.
The hon. Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner) suggests that Liberal Democrats should be ashamed of the Budget, but far from it. There is much in the Budget of which to be proud, and I make it clear to right hon. and hon. Friends in the Conservative party that it is not a Conservative Budget or a Liberal Democrat Budget, but a coalition Budget. I would argue that it draws on the best on both parties. Those parties command the support of the majority of the British people, and the Budget’s approach will deliver benefits to the majority of the British people. I said in the election campaign, when I became aware of the seriousness of the financial situation facing the country, that the position would be much better after the election if cuts that had to be made were implemented by more than one party, as they would be forced to engage with each other and find a balance that would be more acceptable than measures adopted by one party running for a sectional interest that did not have the same strength of appeal. I honestly believe that the coalition has found a dynamic that has delivered something that is greater than the sum of its parts: a Budget that is genuinely progressive.
Simon Hughes
Does my right hon. Friend agree that another part of this package is fundamental? The discussion about the cuts and savings in public expenditure will take place with the public, the trade unions, business, communities and local government, so that decisions are not only informed by the prejudices of civil servants and Ministers but are made as a result of the widest consultation with the British public to make sure that although, yes, they may be tough, they will be absolutely fair.
Malcolm Bruce
I am grateful to my hon. Friend. Opposition Members and the wider audience looking at the Budget should examine it in detail and recognise the extent to which it is based on a much broader consensus and approach to consultation, while being radical across the piece and balanced. That is not easy to achieve, and I am prepared to admit that I had my doubts about whether the Chancellor of the Exchequer would be able to achieve it. I am pleasantly surprised by the extent to which he has been able to do so.
Indeed, there is little in the Budget to which I can fundamentally take exception. It is absolutely true that an increase in VAT is a painful decision—there is no question about that. It is difficult to understand how the Opposition could balance their books without any such tax increases. Although our proposals in the self-contained Liberal Democrat budget did not require an increase in VAT, we always said that if the financial situation required it, we would not rule it out. We never did rule it out, so those attacks that suggest that somehow this is a betrayal are not true. There was careful and guarded explanation of that position.