Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Stephen Williams and Nicholas Dakin(10 years, 12 months ago)
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Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)
14. What recent assessment he has made of the supply of one-bedroom social homes; and if he will make a statement.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Stephen Williams)
There are more than 1 million one-bedroom social homes in England. In the last three years, this Government have delivered more than 150,000 new affordable homes. I have to tell the hon. Gentleman that under the previous Administration, the supply of social homes shrank by 420,000.
Nic Dakin
I want to look forward, Mr Speaker. In north Lincolnshire, at the current rate of availability it will take six years to re-house everybody who is currently liable to the bedroom tax. Does the Minister agree that Conservative-controlled North Lincolnshire council should make sure that everybody who has indicated they want to move but cannot do so is eligible for a discretionary housing payment?
Stephen Williams
The key is in the title—it is a discretionary housing payment, so it will be up to each local authority to assess who should be eligible. This Government are on course to deliver 170,000 new social homes by the end of this Parliament, and this will be the first Administration in decades to leave more social housing in stock at the end of their first period in office.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Stephen Williams and Nicholas Dakin
Stephen Williams
My hon. Friend and other coalition colleagues across Cornwall will be pleased to know that Cornwall is a hotspot for use of the 2011 Act. In my first couple of days in office, officials showed me a map revealing that the 2011 Act had been incredibly popular, with more than 50 assets so far having been registered as being of community use. Through local plans across Cornwall itself, or through neighbourhood plans, local communities should be able to identify areas for special protection and use a local neighbourhood plan to attract sufficient homes, jobs and other essential services. My advice to my hon. Friend is that she should perhaps use a neighbourhood plan.
Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)
When the Secretary of State visited ex-Ministry of Defence sites in Lincolnshire, he saw first hand the poor state they can be left in when the transfer of community assets is done badly by the MOD. What discussions has the Department for Communities and Local Government had with the Ministry of Defence to ensure that in future there is better transfer of assets, such as those in the Kirton-in-Lindsey area in my constituency, and that we do not have continuing sores in our communities, as has been the case in parts of Lincolnshire as a result of heritage?
Stephen Williams
I thank the hon. Gentleman for raising that issue; he will understand that I have not been aware of it in my first couple of weeks in office. I understand that the Secretary of State is aware of it and has already corresponded with the Ministry of Defence about it. I am sure that we will be in touch as soon as we hear an answer from ministerial colleagues.
Tax Fairness
Debate between Stephen Williams and Nicholas Dakin(11 years, 8 months ago)
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Stephen Williams
I will come to that, if the hon. Gentleman is patient.
The key sentences in the Opposition motion and in the coalition Government amendment are those which refer to our support for tax cuts for people on low and middle incomes; we have that in common. However, it rather depends on what one means by that. We know what we mean by it. At the last general election, the Liberal Democrats said that the most effective way to cut taxes for people on low and middle incomes was to raise the income tax threshold to £10,000. That policy was accepted by our coalition partners and it has now been delivered by the coalition Government. I listened carefully to what the Leader of the Opposition said in his speech just a month ago when, lo and behold, Labour was converted to a mansion tax. The purpose of that conversion was specifically to right the wrong that the hon. Member for Nottingham East (Chris Leslie) acknowledged was done in 2007—in other words, to reintroduce the 10p rate. That is what Labour’s policy is. The motion is not entirely clear about that, but we have heard the words of the Leader of the Opposition. We know that, yes, they are now in favour of a mansion tax, but specifically to fund a 10p tax rate, which we think will be completely ineffective.
Stephen Williams
Yes, it was. I said it on “Westminster Hour”, on Radio 5, on the “Daily Politics” show, and on other programmes as well. Indeed I could have written it myself. However, I know precisely what I mean by a mansion tax, but we have not heard spelled out in any detail what Labour Members think it should be. I know what I mean by a tax cut for low and middle-income earners, because that is what this Government are doing while we are in office. I am entirely clear what I mean by the text of the motion; the trouble is that it has not been exactly clear what Labour Members mean by their words.
Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)
This debate is about tax fairness, with contributions from both sides having focused on that challenge. The year 2013 is not 2008 or 2001; we are in different times and facing different challenges and, therefore, different choices. We are undoubtedly in tough times, in difficult times; we are in a period of austerity, and, as a result, we have different choices to make.
Individuals also have different choices to make. I am being contacted, as I am sure every other right hon. and hon. Member is, by constituents living through these tough times and finding it difficult to make ends meet, owing to rising prices, fuelled by the hike in VAT, which was one of the very first decisions of this Conservative-led Administration. Despite describing it as a tax bombshell in the general election campaign, the Liberal Democrats sadly supported this most regressive of tax increases. Energy bills, fuel bills, food bills and rail fares are all rising, making it difficult for ordinary people and families to make ends meet.
Prices are rising and incomes are falling. Ordinary people are finding it difficult to make ends meet, because incomes are falling and people are losing their jobs or losing hours they want to work or reducing their pay in order to help businesses through these difficult times and to manage the situation together. That is what businesses in my constituency are doing—managing the situation with their work force—which often means reducing hours and pay, but keeping businesses and households afloat.
These are difficult times, with the squeeze on hard-working families worsened by the reduction in tax credit eligibility and the looming spectre of the bedroom tax, to which several right hon. and hon. Members have referred. People are struggling to make ends meet. They are doing their best to keep their heads above water. As my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton North (Alex Cunningham) said, we see the number of food banks expanding and child poverty rising. In 2013, these are things that none of us would wish to see in the United Kingdom—one of the richest countries in the world—on our collective watch. These are tough times in the real world.
Stephen Williams
Yes, in tough times we have to make tough choices. I recognise that some of them are uncomfortable, but does the hon. Gentleman lament the fact that in 2007, when budget revenues were increasing and the economy was perceived to be booming, the previous Labour Government decided to put up taxes on the very poorest?
Nic Dakin
The hon. Gentleman will be alert to the fact that I came into this House only in 2010. We can all look back with hindsight and be critical of decisions made at different times. One of the issues for us all in these difficult times is whether with hindsight on the decisions we are making today people will say we made the right decisions.
Voting Age
Debate between Stephen Williams and Nicholas Dakin(11 years, 10 months ago)
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Stephen Williams
I will leave matters relating to Scotland to other contributors. If you permit it, Mr Speaker, we will hear from that corner of the United Kingdom later.
The case for lowering the voting age is usually made—the hon. Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) has alluded to this—on the grounds of other rights and responsibilities that young people already have at 16 and 17. I will come to those later, but I would prefer to justify lowering the franchise age to 16 on the principal grounds that I believe that 16 and 17-year-olds have sufficient maturity and knowledge to cast a vote, if they want to do so. We do not have compulsory voting in this country, so we would simply be affording 16 and 17-year-olds the opportunity to vote if they wished to do so.
Nic Dakin (Scunthorpe) (Lab)
The hon. Gentleman is setting out his case very well. I spent my whole life working with 16 to 19-year-olds until I came to this place, and my experience suggests that they are as good at making decisions on voting as the people who are assembled here.
Finance (No. 2) Bill
Debate between Stephen Williams and Nicholas Dakin(14 years, 1 month ago)
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Nic Dakin
I have already given way.
In the summer, the Chancellor was keen to hold up Ireland as an example of a country with an approach to the economic challenges that we face that should be applauded. There is less talk of Ireland now, as that economy spins into double-dip recession and loses its triple A rating, as we heard earlier. The Irish Government’s debt has increased rather than decreased, as a result of over-aggressive cuts in public expenditure, and the economy is now in serious peril. The last time we had a peacetime coalition, the then Governor of the Bank of England’s advice—to take an aggressive approach to reducing spending—was followed, precipitating the great depression of the 1930s. I am afraid that Governors of the Bank of England, like politicians, are only mortal and do not always get it right.
There is something very pessimistic about the Government’s approach. Where once they were optimistic, now they see only negatives, hence the biggest rise in VAT—the most unfair and regressive of all taxes—in a generation, despite cast-iron promises from the leaders of both parties in the coalition during the election that this would not happen. Representing Scunthorpe, I know a bit about cast iron: it should last a bit longer than a few months. There has been further pessimism, with the attacks on universal benefits signalled by last week’s breaking of another promise—the promise not to cut child benefit.
Stephen Williams
If the hon. Gentleman is seriously suggesting that taking away child benefit from families in the higher-rate income tax bracket is a cut that should not be proceeded with, will he say what cuts he thinks should be proceeded with?
Nic Dakin
The ending of universal child benefit is a cut against children and families, and I do not think it is the right thing to do. It would seem that children and families are to pay the price of the global economic crisis caused by the failure of financial businesses and markets around the world. That hardly seems fair to me. To answer the hon. Gentleman’s question, I would rather leave child benefit in place and not give £6.4 billion back to businesses, through changes in their taxes, much of which will go back to the banks that got us into this mess in the first place.
This Bill represents a real opportunity to put in place the infrastructure spending that is a crucial prerequisite for economic growth. Sadly, it appears to be a missed opportunity. We have seen excellent planned investment, such as Building Schools for the Future, the playbuilder programme and so on, scrapped. Ministers then appear surprised when construction companies have to lay people off.