Budget Resolutions

Stephen Kerr Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)]

I want to wish the Chancellor all the best. He talks about preparing for the future, but let us look at the reality of the figures contained in the OBR book. We are faced with the United Kingdom falling to the bottom of growth in the G7. When we look at GDP per capita for the years 2019 and 2020, we see that the OBR has reduced its forecasts from 1.7% to 0.7% for 2019 and from 1.9% to 0.7% for 2020. That is what post-Brexit Britain is going to look like—an absolute shredding of growth forecasts for the next three years. The OBR talks about GDP—

[Stephen Kerr (Stirling) (Con)]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Ian Blackford]

No, I will not, because this is the third party speech and the practice is that it is not to be intervened on.

The change in GDP that we will see in the OBR book is a cut to GDP of 2.7%—that is what this Government are presiding over. It is a threat to the wages, living standards and job prospects of people up and down the United Kingdom. This Government should be ashamed of themselves. When we look at the rhetoric of the Budget speech—[Interruption.] Conservative Members are laughing, but we see a fiscal loosening in this Budget of 0.1%. That does not take into account the reality of the risks the people of the UK face.

Let me welcome the removal of VAT on our police and fire services, but remind the Chancellor of the Exchequer that, together with his friend the Secretary of State for Scotland, he was given the opportunity to support an SNP amendment to the Finance Bill in 2015 that would have removed VAT from Scotland—[Interruption.] I can hear the remarks that are coming from those on the Conservative Benches, but I remind them that the Conservative manifesto supported the establishment of Police Scotland. It was the vindictiveness and nastiness of the Tory Government that imposed VAT on Scotland, which has ripped £140 million out of our frontline services. When the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Secretary of State for Scotland were given the opportunity in the 2015 Finance Bill to act they failed. It is a disgrace that we have had £140 million taken out of frontline spending—

--- Later in debate ---

[Ms Nadine Dorries (Mid Bedfordshire) (Con)]

It is a relief to rise after the speech from the SNP spokesman, which was actually longer than the official Opposition’s—and half as riveting.

Budget resolutions tend to be about figures and statements that can be quite dry and which are often leaked before the actual Budget statement, so I am delighted that one of its headline measures—the scrapping of stamp duty on properties up to £300,000—was not leaked. It was an exciting announcement.

[Stephen Kerr]

I thank my hon. Friend for giving way—something that the SNP spokesman was not prepared to do, for whatever reason. Does she agree that the Chancellor’s announcement on stamp duty presents an almighty challenge to the Scottish Government, whose land and buildings transaction tax has been an unmitigated disaster, and does she think that the leader of the SNP in Westminster should go to the First Minister and suggest that the policy be followed in Scotland?

[Ms Dorries]

I am sure that SNP Members have heard my hon. Friend’s point and will take it forward—tomorrow, I would imagine.

I wish to address an issue that is very close to my heart—and actually the reason I became a Conservative MP in the first place: home ownership. We have heard today measures that amount to a revolution in house building: the target of 300,000 homes per year and the establishment of Homes England to bring together all the strands needed to meet this target. It will deal with people who land grab, the planning application process and the training of skilled artisans and workmen to build the homes. Homes England will have the authority required to drive forward that degree of home ownership.

It is sometimes easy to forget what home ownership means to many people, and we have not seen measures like these in the UK since the 1970s. I am one of those Members who understands the value of home ownership more than most. I lived in a council house until I was in my late 20s, and I was reminded of this earlier in the year while canvassing in a constituency that was not mine—it was in Luton in Stopsley ward. A lady on whose door I knocked said to me, “Oh, I know you. You’re not standing here, but I couldn’t vote for you anyway because you support home ownership.” I found that quite remarkable, because I was knocking not on a council estate door but on a private, well-appointed home.

It was a seminal moment for me. This lady said to me, “The thing is, Nadine, I’m a trade unionist, and I abhor right to buy and home ownership, because people with mortgages don’t strike.” We then discussed how people, when they buy a home, prioritise their own private capital over and above the social capital. She was a principled lady with strong views, and I never want to diminish somebody else’s point of view—it is just as relevant as mine. She can abhor home ownership as much as I adore it, although the end of our conversation was interesting. I asked her if she was in private rented accommodation, and she told me it was her own home. That was an interesting moment.

That said, I took on board this lady’s points. She said, “You should not be a Conservative. You should be a Labour politician. You come from a council estate. I know your background.” It was very interesting. Indeed, I have witnessed what happens to people when they are given the opportunity to buy their own home. I will describe what it is like not to own a home. So many people are in that position right now. On my estate, every door was painted the same colour—by the council—and the gardens on the ground floors were divided by packing cases and wooden pallets. There were no flowers and what had been gardens had become patches of mud. Life was pretty grey and people worked at the Ford’s factory and nobody had any particular aspiration to do anything else.

When people began to own those council houses, however, it seemed to change overnight. People started to paint their front doors their own colours and express their individuality. The packing cases were ripped up and painted fences would be put in their place. Flowers were planted in the gardens. People started working overtime. The very first car was bought and arrived in our road. My mother, a teacher, was giving almost nightly classes to women knocking on the door for lessons because they wanted to go out to work—I regarded home ownership as a driver of equality for women because it gave them a reason to break free from the kitchen sink and get out to work.

I saw a transformation on the estate because of home ownership. Its benefits include family stability. If a family do not own, they rent, but is the most unstable position for a family to live in, as they have to move perhaps every six months and do not get to live in the kind of properties or areas they want to live in. People who buy their own homes can decide where to live and where to send their children to school.