Oral Answers to Questions

Torsten Bell Excerpts

Tuesday 9th December 2025 Commons Chamber

[Jack Rankin (Windsor) (Con)]

4. What assessment she has made of the potential impact of the autumn Budget 2025 on levels of incentives to work.

[The Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury (Torsten Bell)]

The forecasts accompanying the Budget set out that the Office for Budget Responsibility expects employment levels to rise in every year of this Parliament. They also set out that employment is forecast to be higher in every year than previously expected back in March.

[Jack Rankin]

Having 1 million young people not in work, education or training and 2.8 million people out of work on long-term sickness benefits is both a financial catastrophe and a moral failure. The Prime Minister has rightly said that it is his moral mission to get young people into work, but how does the Minister square that with two Budgets that have hiked taxes on working people by £66 billion while giving a pay rise to those on benefits?

[Torsten Bell]

The hon. Member is right to call those things a moral and economic disgrace. Does he know who created them? It was the Conservative party opposite. Who saw a 50% rise in the number of those not in education, employment or training? The party opposite. Who created the benefits system that is failing today? The party opposite. Who failed to reform the benefits system? The party opposite.

[Katrina Murray (Cumbernauld and Kirkintilloch) (Lab)]

5. What progress she has made on the financial inclusion strategy. [R]

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[Dave Robertson (Lichfield) (Lab)]

Constituents across Lichfield, Burntwood and the villages will be pleased to see the Government taking action on the cost of living by reducing energy bills, but they want the benefits to be fair and felt by all bill payers. What steps will the Chancellor take with Cabinet colleagues to ensure that reductions in energy bills are reflected in standing charges, not just in unit prices?

[The Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury (Torsten Bell)]

Energy bills are too high. The Conservatives left Britain dependent on the rollercoaster of gas prices, and left families paying almost £2 billion on bills for their failed energy efficiency scheme, the energy company obligation. We are scrapping ECO and taking some of the expensive levies off bills. My hon. Friend makes an important point about standing charges. He will know that Ofgem continues to consider low standing charge tariffs for exactly the reason that he raises. More generally, reducing energy bills is so important precisely because they are typically a higher share of disposable income for low-income households.

[Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)]

T7. There is agreement across the House on the importance of access to cash, as well as on the importance of access to banking services, which are critical for high streets in areas such as Cupar and Letham in my constituency. When will the Government agree to have the Financial Conduct Authority review the criteria for access to banking services? There are to be 350 banking hubs, but that is a meaningless number if communities continue to lose face-to-face services.

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[Steve Barclay (North East Cambridgeshire) (Con)]

The Office for Budget Responsibility shows that welfare spending will be £32 billion a year more at the end of this Parliament, just as a result of decisions in the last Budget. Why was the Chancellor not more honest in the Labour party manifesto about the choices she wanted to make?

[Torsten Bell]

The welfare state that the Conservative party created is failing, and we are changing it. Welfare spending rose three times as fast under the Conservative Government than it has under this one, because they created a broken welfare system, and I repeat: we will change it.

[Antonia Bance (Tipton and Wednesbury) (Lab)]

Last week I went to Alucast in Wednesbury, one of our brilliant foundries. I have also been to Newby Foundries. Both told me of their relief that the landfill tax will not impose significant additional costs on them. I wonder whether the Chancellor would like to set out the action she is taking to support our brilliant manufacturing and automotive industries at this Budget.

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[Rupert Lowe (Great Yarmouth) (Ind)]

The Chancellor has embarked on a Fabian programme of brutal tax-and-spend economics that might please the dwindling number of Labour voters, but is hollowing out the nation’s productive base. Those who take risks, invest long term and create high-quality jobs are increasingly voting with their feet. Record numbers of top earners—the rain-makers who actually bankroll public services—are leaving the UK for good, taking their wealth and, more importantly, their brain power with them. Does the Chancellor even begin to understand the lasting and irreversible damage that she is causing to the British economy?

[Torsten Bell]

We have all watched the hon. Member voting with his feet by leaving the bunch of crazies that he was with before. Let us get back to what this Government are doing to drive growth: we are increasing public investment by £120 billion over this Parliament and making sure that things get built. We are building housing and giving a default “yes” to developments around train stations. We are building transport infrastructure, including the lower Thames crossing and expansion at Heathrow and Gatwick airports. We are expanding energy infrastructure at Wylfa and Sizewell. This Government are backing the builders, month after month.

[Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent and Rhymney) (Lab)]

The Minister for pensions was brilliant at the Budget in helping our mining communities across the UK. Will he provide an update on plans for changing the surplus sharing arrangements for both the mineworkers’ pension scheme and the British Coal staff superannuation scheme?

[Torsten Bell]

My hon. Friend has been a powerful campaigner for those surpluses to be shared with the members of those pension schemes. He knows that we made an announcement at the Budget to ensure that the British Coal staff superannuation scheme surplus is shared with its members, and I know that the trustees are bringing forward their proposals on the sharing of future surpluses.

[Alan Mak (Havant) (Con)]

The Budget cut the venture capital trusts tax relief that allowed investors to back Britain’s fastest-growing companies. How can the Chancellor claim to support our entrepreneurs when she is cutting off the funding that they rely on?