Future Government Spending

Stewart Hosie Excerpts

Wednesday 4th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[Stewart Hosie (Dundee East) (SNP)]

We debated similar issues early in January, when the Government laid out their proposals for the “Charter for Budget Responsibility”. I explained in that debate that the Government had promised that they would eradicate the entire structural deficit within the five years of this Parliament. It is important to understand what the Government pledged. They specifically stated that debt would begin to fall as a share of GDP in 2014-15, that the current account would be in balance in 2015-16 and that public sector net borrowing in that year would be barely £20 billion. We now know that, on their numbers, debt will not begin to fall as a share of GDP until 2016-17 at the earliest, that the current account will not be back in the black until at least the following year and that public sector net borrowing will not be £20 billion for the forthcoming year but almost four times that amount, at £75 billion. In short, the Chancellor and the Government have failed to meet a single one of the key targets that they set for themselves. The Tory policy of a fixed-term approach to deficit reduction strangled the recovery in the early years of this Parliament, and with tens of billions in cuts and tax rises still to come, the inescapable conclusion is that austerity has failed.

[Oliver Colvile (Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport) (Con)]

Does the hon. Gentleman not recognise that there was a big issue, and that it was called Greece? The problems there and in the eurozone blew everything off course completely.

--- Later in debate ---

[Stewart Hosie]

That is precisely why the Government should have taken a flexible approach to deficit consolidation, rather than a fixed-term approach. I will say more about that in a moment.

It is useful today to identify precisely what is on offer, other than the £30 billion of extra cuts that were promised by the Government in January. That is, of course, no more than a continuation of the existing failed policy of fixed-term deficit consolidation and a plan for further attacks on the welfare budget. It is a plan to balance the books on the backs of the poor, which we now understand means taking levels of public expenditure back to those of the 1930s.

Today’s motion calls for a

“different, fairer and more balanced approach”

and I agree with that. The key thing that needs to be changed is the fixed-term approach to cutting the deficit. Instead of that approach, which has self-evidently failed so far, we should have a more flexible, medium-term strategy whose first principle should be about reducing debt to a “prudent” level. It is important that the Government of the day should specify what is or is not prudent, depending on the real circumstances that they face, precisely to deal with the kind of external shocks that the hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport (Oliver Colvile) has just mentioned.

[Mrs Main]

I hope that the hon. Gentleman can enlighten me. What are the

“sensible reductions in public spending”

proposed in the motion, and how much will they raise? I really would like to know, given that the motion mentions them.

[Stewart Hosie]

It is a Labour motion, and I might not even support it. I am merely pointing out that the Tory party told us that the current account would be back in the black, but it is not. We are borrowing almost £80 billion this year. The Tories’ austerity programme has failed.

We need to reduce debt to a prudent level, with the Government of the day specifying what is or is not prudent, depending on the circumstances. A second principle should be that, once debt is reduced, the Government should maintain a balanced budget on average over the medium to long term, not in a way that would prevent them from implementing the steps they believed necessary to achieve their long-term objective, but in order to afford them the flexibility to deal with external shocks over the medium term.

A third principle is that the Government should achieve and maintain a level of net worth that provides a buffer against unforeseen factors. A fourth calls on the Government to manage fiscal risks prudently. A fifth principle is that the Government should pursue policies consistent with a reasonable degree of predictability about the level and stability of tax rates. That is incredibly important, because the tax system, tax rates and tax certainty form a vital component of fiscal stability and fiscal responsibility.

[Sandra Osborne]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Stewart Hosie]

I am sorry; I have given way already, and we are time-limited.

The motion also calls for a programme to get the current account into surplus and to get the national debt falling as a share of GDP as soon as possible. In principle, I agree with that, but my party wants to see an explicit end to austerity because, as the hon. Member for Rutherglen and Hamilton West (Tom Greatrex) pointed out, people have suffered enough already. That is why we have set out a plan for a modest real-terms increase in departmental spending that would deliver £180 billion of investment in the next Parliament. Our plan would result in the deficit coming down, from 3.4% to 3%, 2.5% and 2.1% of GDP from 2016-17. It is a plan that would see the national debt fall as a share of GDP, albeit on a different, more shallow trajectory. It is a plan that would in the first year, 2016-17, not see £23 billion of extra Tory-Liberal cuts, but £25 billion of investment. We think that is extremely sensible, and it ties in to what the Chief Secretary said about active government and what difference that and the Government’s investment can make.

The motion also calls for

“sensible reductions in public spending”.

Our plan is to see a modest increase in departmental spending. Although I would most certainly accept a sensible reduction in spending on Trident and its replacement—a policy apparently supported by three quarters of Labour candidates—that is not on offer today. Sadly, what Labour appears to have proposed is no more than keeping to the Tory spending cuts, and we simply cannot support that.

I hope that tomorrow, in Scotland, Labour will take a different view, and support a real end to austerity and a real increase in public spending, because we do need to take a different approach. We need to take a different approach to economic management because if we do not, we will have set in concrete a further attack on our welfare budgets. With 22% of our children, 11% of our pensioners and 21% of our working-age adults in Scotland in poverty, launching a further attack on welfare, as this Government are planning to do, is simply wrong. We also need to change the way we manage the economy or we will be faced with a plan, set out in January by this Government, for future discretionary consolidation that changes the ratio of cuts to tax rises from 4:1 to more than 9:1—in effect, trying to balance the books on the backs of the poor. I am sure no Opposition Member would support that.

This motion also talks of the need for

“an economic plan that delivers the sustained rises in living standards needed to boost tax revenues”.

That is sensible, so I hope the Labour party and others would support the Scottish Government’s economic strategy, which was published yesterday. In particular, I hope they would support the Scottish business pledge, which is designed not just to promote economic growth, which is necessary, but to drive fairness and help tackle inequality at the same time. In return for assistance from the Scottish Government, businesses will be required to pay the living wage, commit to an innovation programme, cease using zero-hours contracts, agree to pursue international opportunities, make progress on gender balance, support youth and so on. That is the kind of initiative that should form the bedrock of any genuine long-term economic plan, and it is one that recognises not only that business growth and economic growth are essential to fund and pay for our vital public services, but that squeezing out inequality is an absolute prerequisite for a growing economy in the first place.

I am sure that there will be more of this debate as we move towards the end of this Parliament and into the election. I am disappointed that Labour appears on its last Opposition day to have said that it will stick to the Tory spending cuts. Let us hope that the results after the election ensure that everybody can change their mind.