Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Tom Blenkinsop and George Osborne

Wednesday 25th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

I certainly agree with my hon. Friend that Barnardo’s is a brilliant charity and that we should all congratulate it on the work it does. We have a huge responsibility to people who are in the care of the state, which does not end when they are 18 years old. That is why we are announcing new measures in the Queen’s Speech to include support from a personal adviser, for example, until these people are 25 and to make sure that other bodies such as local authorities have a care for those people, bringing all the opportunities to their attention. This is part of the life chances strategy, which lies at the heart of this Queen’s Speech.

[Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)]

Q3. The Chancellor wanted a march of the makers, and today hundreds of steelworkers are marching to Parliament for their future and for their communities. Why do the Government back China’s bid for market economy status against the interests of British steelworkers? Why does this Chancellor block changes to the lesser duty tariff against the interests of British steelworkers? When will he set down an industrial strategy to put British steelworkers’ interests ahead of his own?

[Mr Osborne]

Our thoughts are, of course, with the steelmakers and their families at this very difficult time. [Interruption.] If we take a step back, we can all acknowledge that there is a global crisis in the steel industry, with tens of thousands of jobs lost across Europe alone and many tens of thousands beyond that. We are taking specific action today to help Tata, Port Talbot and related works across the country. My right hon. Friend the Business Secretary has been to India with the First Minister of Wales in a cross-party effort. Nationally, we have taken action to reduce energy charges on energy-intensive industries; we have taken action to ensure that there is more flexibility with emission regulations; we are doing everything we can to help this industry at a very difficult time, including making sure that there are tough tariffs on Chinese dumping. As a result of the tariffs introduced on rebar steel, those imports are down by over 90%.

Spending Review and Autumn Statement

Debate between Tom Blenkinsop and George Osborne

Wednesday 25th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

Peter Hendy is doing an excellent job in sorting out the finances of Network Rail. We funded the projects in control period 5 and funded additional spill-overs into control period 6. East-west rail is an important project and it will go ahead.

[Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)]

The autumn statement confirms the Chancellor’s climate change exemptions, which leave energy-intensives such as steel companies no better off cash-wise. The partial exemptions from renewables obligation certificates and feed-in tariffs, which are now to end in four months anyway, leave the Chancellor’s new permanent exemption as close to worthless as it gets. The Chancellor announced four years ago an exemption to his carbon price floor tax. Where is it?

[Mr Osborne]

We are providing a permanent exemption to the maximum amount allowed by EU state rules for steel industries in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency and elsewhere, as well as chemicals and other energy-intensive industries. This will be a permanent exemption, rather than a grant from the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills. That makes it much more sustainable going forward.

EU Budget (Surcharge)

Debate between Tom Blenkinsop and George Osborne

Monday 10th November 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

We will never face such a large payment or such an unexpected period of time in which to pay, which is why we are getting permanent changes to the budget rules. That requires the consent of all member states, and we have that.

[Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)]

The UK’s deficit at the moment is the worst in the European Union. Will the Chancellor be selling that as a result as well?

[Mr Osborne]

Some of us remember inheriting a budget deficit of 11.5% from the previous Labour Government. It has fallen by more than a third. We will get the forecasts from the Office for Budget Responsibility in December.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Tom Blenkinsop and George Osborne

Tuesday 29th April 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

The hon. Gentleman obviously has not looked at today’s GDP numbers, because they show that the sector that has grown most strongly is manufacturing.

[Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)]

Services.

[Mr Osborne]

The hon. Gentleman mentions services, but manufacturing has grown by 1.3% in the last quarter and services by 0.9%. Even a Labour MP can work out that 1.3 is higher than 0.9.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Osborne]

The Opposition do have an anti-business agenda, but the Government are taking a different approach. We are reducing business taxes; we have introduced an employment allowance this month which will help small companies with their jobs tax; and of course next year we are taking under-21s out of the jobs tax. Labour’s plan is now not only to increase corporation tax; the party is discussing plans to put up the jobs tax, which would be a total disaster.

[Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)]

Since May 2010, long-term unemployment in my constituency has increased by 27%, long-term youth unemployment has increased by 40% and average real weekly wages have decreased by £116.93. Does the Chancellor want to take credit for that?

[Mr Osborne]

The hard-working people of the hon. Gentleman’s constituency should take credit for the fact that unemployment is down by 21% in his constituency and youth unemployment is down by 29% there.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Tom Blenkinsop and George Osborne

Tuesday 28th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

It sounds very tough, campaigning in Hereford.

I thank my hon. Friend for bringing those businesses to the attention of the House, and congratulate him on the support that he has given to the economic policies that are helping them to grow. He is absolutely right: we must continue to support firms of that kind. High street shops, pubs, cafés and the like will, of course, benefit from the £1,000 rate relief which will be introduced this spring, and which will be a huge help to all—or most—of the businesses on the high streets of Hereford.

[Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)]

Average weekly gross pay in my constituency has fallen by 32.5% since 2010. Why?

[Mr Osborne]

The person who had the best answer to that question was the head of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, who said very clearly that the reason why the country was poorer was the very deep recession. He said that we have had the biggest recession in 100 years and that it would be astonishing if household incomes had not fallen and earnings had not fallen. This country is poorer because of the disastrous economic policies of the shadow Chancellor. It is under this Government that the economy is growing and jobs are being created, including jobs in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency.

Autumn Statement

Debate between Tom Blenkinsop and George Osborne

Wednesday 5th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

I will get back to my hon. Friend about the specific point about the bid for new housing in Gloucester. More broadly, we are investing more capital in housing development. We are also standing alongside families trying to buy their first home with our Firstbuy shared equity scheme, and we are also providing guarantees to registered social landlords not only to build social housing, but to build housing for the private rented sector. So in all sorts of ways we are helping the people of Gloucester, and I will look specifically at what more we can do to help.

[Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)]

The corporation tax take, VAT take, income tax take and growth are all lower than the OBR predicted in March. The Chancellor is forecast to accrue an increase in national debt in five years greater than Labour accrued in 13 years. Moreover, from now till 2013 the International Labour Organisation unemployment rate increases by 0.2%, as is stated on page 86, table B.1, so how are more people predicted to get jobs when the OBR says completely the opposite?

[Mr Osborne]

I would advise the hon. Gentleman to look at that table on employment. It shows employment going up by 1 million.

Jobs and Growth

Debate between Tom Blenkinsop and George Osborne

Wednesday 12th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

I guess that is called an “Ed Balls endorsement”—that is what the last Chancellor and Tony Blair got used to. We increased the R and D tax credit for small businesses in the Budget, so we have taken that idea—which we came up with—and introduced it. I am very pleased that the Labour party now supports it, but what about this idea that a Labour Chancellor would sit there in No. 11 with his home-made scales of justice weighing up the companies he likes and those he does not like and levying different levels of tax on them? What happened to that? It was the centrepiece of the Labour conference two weeks ago, and it shows why Labour simply cannot be trusted to run the economy of this country and why it has become the anti-business party again.

[Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)]

I thank the Chancellor for giving way. It is interesting that he brings up those points, but can he please tell us where the ghost—or the ghoul—of the regional growth fund is? It has now been six months and the north-east is still waiting for the regional growth fund money that it was promised. Businesses are hanging on the wire for that money. Will he please tell us where that cash is?

[Mr Osborne]

Again, that was another opportunity to talk about Labour’s big economy idea. The hon. Gentleman did not take it, but I am glad that he raised the regional growth fund, which has allocated money to the north-east and other parts of the country. That money is flowing and those projects will get going. We are also setting up enterprise zones in Teesside and Tyneside, and doing what we can to get the north-east economy, which also suffered in recent years, on the front foot, creating private sector jobs so that that region, too, has prosperity.

Independent Banking Commission Report

Debate between Tom Blenkinsop and George Osborne

Monday 12th September 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

I agree with my hon. Friend that London and the United Kingdom constitute a very attractive place in which to locate a universal bank. We have what I think will be the best regulatory regime in the world, with the best regulators. We also have a good rule of law. This is a good place in which to live, and it happens to have a good time zone as well. All those factors make it a very good place from which to run financial services.

[Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)]

The Chancellor may recall that the coalition agreement called for net lending targets for the nationalised banks. Why did the Project Merlin deal involve much weaker targets for gross lending?

[Mr Osborne]

Net lending targets were tried by the previous Government, and when we looked at that in detail on coming into office, we saw why they had failed so spectacularly, and decided not to repeat the mistake.

Global Economy

Debate between Tom Blenkinsop and George Osborne

Thursday 11th August 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

It would of course have been ruinous, not just for individuals but for the Government. One of the largest items of Government spending I inherited, unfortunately, was debt interest. We are raising taxes in order to pay our international creditors and that interest is forecast to rise, sadly, over the Parliament, as we reduce the deficit. That is why it is so important to try to get debt falling by the end of the Parliament. Of course, any reduction in our gilts yields is good for the Government and saves us money, too.

[Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)]

Can the Chancellor explain why his own Office for Budget Responsibility forecasts £46 billion of more borrowing?

[Mr Osborne]

The Office for Budget Responsibility makes its independent fiscal forecasts and, I think, one of the great policy developments of this Government has been the creation of that independent body, which will make its autumn forecasts in the usual way.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Tom Blenkinsop and George Osborne

Tuesday 16th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Tom Blenkinsop (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Lab)]

The Federation of Small Businesses North East and the insolvency trade body R3 have wound up one in 10 businesses that were unprepared for the 2.5% increase in VAT next year. Kingston university also recently showed that small businesses in the north-east intend to shed staff. Is not VAT the real jobs tax?

[Mr Osborne]

As I say, we are doing that because we need to deal with the Budget deficit. I thought it was the policy of the hon. Gentleman’s party that a greater share of the consolidation should be borne by tax rises; I thought that that was now the official policy. It is also clear that the previous Government were planning a VAT rise. Businesses have had plenty of notice of the increase that is coming in in January, and I am sure they will be able to cope in the same way as they coped with the VAT rise at the beginning of this January.