Government's Management of the Economy

Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd February 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Slough) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to take part in this debate on the Government’s management of the economy and Conservative economic failure over the past decade. Ten years on from the rose garden press conference, I took another look at the coalition agreement—the ultimate Faustian pact—and I noticed this in the small print:

“The deficit reduction programme takes precedence over any of the other measures in this agreement”.

It is there in black and white—the Conservative Government had one goal and one goal only: to cut public spending.

The Chancellor told us at the time that it was to reduce the deficit, but we see now that it was to reduce the size of the state for ideological reasons. We have seen cuts to police numbers, roads, libraries, youth clubs, courts, housing, schools and council budgets, including in Slough. And who suffered most under austerity? The poorest and the most vulnerable—those most in need of a helping hand. If you seek a monument to those 10 years of Tory economics, visit a food bank. In Slough alone, 6,500 food packages were given to those in crisis—a 37% increase on the year before.

Then came the coronavirus. The pandemic has revealed something brilliant about our character. We volunteered, donated and looked out for our neighbours. We did not need David Cameron’s big society to be telling us what to do; it already existed. It is in our neighbourhoods, our community groups, our churches, mosques, gurdwaras, mandirs, synagogues and temples, in our trade unions and in our families. But the pandemic has also revealed something rotten within our system. It has revealed the fragility of our public services after years of neglect. It has revealed stark inequalities. It has shown Britain to be a country divided by class, race and wealth. Many millions are confined to small flats or overcrowded houses, seeing their incomes disappear, running up debts, defaulting on rents, and turning to food banks with no Government help.

The greatest lesson from the pandemic is that we need a fresh start—the kind of fresh start outlined by my right hon. and learned Friend the Leader of the Opposition just last week. When we beat the virus we must win the recovery, not simply return to the same old policies that weakened our economy in the first place. The past 10 years were a disaster for millions of people, and people cannot afford for the next 10 years to be even worse. Yes, we must build back better, but we must build back fairer too.