Future Government Spending

William Bain Excerpts

Wednesday 4th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[Helen Goodman]

rose—

[Mr William Bain (Glasgow North East) (Lab)]

rose—

[Mr Gauke]

I will give way to the hon. Lady. She will give us an answer.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Gauke]

I will give someone the opportunity to make a claim for it.

[Mr Bain]

I am most grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way at last.

The “Charter for Budget Responsibility” states that the Treasury will balance the current budget

“by the end of the third year of the rolling, 5-year forecast period.”

Can the Minister point out the reference to 2017-18? If he cannot, his figure of £30 billion of cuts is entirely bogus.

[Mr Gauke]

It is by looking at where we are and then adding three years. It is really not that difficult.

In the motion, the Opposition attempt to evade the hard choice between more tax or more borrowing facing those who oppose spending cuts by saying they will grow the economy faster so that wages go up and the problem is solved, despite this being a structural issue. Every Government want the economy to grow faster. When François Hollande came to power, with a new economic model praised by the Leader of the Opposition, I have no doubt that he wanted the French economy to grow faster, but it did not, and I have no doubt that in 2008 the Labour Government also wanted the economy to grow faster, but that did not prevent it from shrinking by 6%. Wanting an economy to grow is not the same as achieving economic growth, and nor is it an excuse for not making the hard decisions necessary to reduce the deficit.

Where is Labour’s plan for growth? If we examine the motion, do we find a single policy that would help economic growth? One specific policy is mentioned, about punishing high earners, but that is hardly a policy for growth. After five years, where are these policies for growth? They could mention increasing the number of apprenticeships, reforming banking regulation and increasing infrastructure investment, except that those are policies delivered by this Government. Or they could set out how they would encourage business investment by putting in place competitive business taxes and reducing regulatory burdens, except those are policies they intend to reverse. Or they could mention improving education standards or securing the future of universities, except that they would abandon the progress we have made, not least with their shambolic policy on tuition fees.

Labour’s policies have three characteristics: they are not long term, they are not economic, and they do not constitute a plan. The motion reveals a vacuous Opposition horribly ill-prepared for government. The motion, like the Opposition, has little to say on macro-economic policy and nothing to say on supply-side policy. It is evasive on the deficit and incoherent on economic growth. The motion, like the Opposition, is destined for a heavy defeat.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr William Bain (Glasgow North East) (Lab)]

It has been a pleasure to listen to the whole of this debate and to make a contribution at this stage. It has been a revealing debate, showing the paucity of the Government and the Conservatives’ argument for re-election. It comes down to this: “We have nearly doubled the debt, we have completely broken our promise on the deficit, we have stripped growth out of the economy for the first three years, we have been the worst Government for 140 years on wages and living standards—now go on, vote for us and give us a second term.” That is it: no positive policies; no vision of how the economy can be different; no vision of how to get more people involved in work, in decent, good paying jobs; no vision of high skill, high investment, high exports. No; instead, we have just had negativity and fear and I suspect that that is what will do for this Government on 7 May.

[Mark Hendrick]

My hon. Friend omitted to mention the fact that voters will, on average, be £1,600 per person worse off than they were at the last general election. What sort of Government can present a spectacle of people being worse off by that amount and still expect to get re-elected?

[Mr Bain]

Indeed, and as the Institute for Fiscal Studies said this morning, this has been the slowest recovery in living standards in history. I do not think any reasonable Government would expect to be re-elected with that kind of record, and those are the facts.

What was extraordinary about the debate was the way in which the Government, having twice moved the goalposts on their deficit target, again tried to pull this extraordinary trick over the eyes of the country today. As I said in an intervention, the “Charter for Budget Responsibility”, which this House endorsed in January, made no reference to balancing the current Budget by 2017-18. It talked about a rolling five-year forecast, yet it was used today by the Financial Secretary, who is no longer in his place, to refer to a bogus sum saying that £30 billion in cuts were implied by that charter. That type of approach shows that the view of the Conservative party and this Government is, “This is as good as it gets”, and that we should have no ambition for our country of higher growth, higher skills and higher investment than that which they have been able to provide. My constituents and Opposition Members reject that completely.

Let us look at what the International Monetary Fund is saying on growth. It says that next year growth will fall compared with this year and that it will still be falling the year after. Is that really as good as it gets for Britain in this early stage of the 21st century? The next Government should follow policies that see us have higher growth, higher wages and higher skills.

It was also revealing in this debate that the Minister could not say whether he supported the Office for Budget Responsibility evaluating the fiscal plans of any other party, and small wonder because the National Institute of Economic and Social Research, the one organisation that has evaluated the plans and looked at the difference between the Conservative spending plans and those that would be followed by Labour, has said that there will be more growth, more jobs, and faster rises in wages under Labour’s spending plans than under those of the Tories. So there it is: confirmation that if we want to have ambition for our country, a fairer society, better public spending and better living standards and outcomes for our constituents, seeing an end to this Government is absolutely critical.

We also need in this debate a recognition that the way the Government have tried to reduce the deficit in this Parliament has brought exceptional hardship to our constituents. Anyone who has held the hand of a disabled person, as I have, having to pay the wicked, pernicious bedroom tax, with tears in her eyes, wondering how any decent Government could ever inflict that on any of its citizens, knows that the course the country has been on for the past five years is wrong and needs to change. Anyone who has seen, as I have in my surgery, people on low incomes with family members suffering sanctions imposed through targets from the Department for Work and Pensions knows that we are a better country than that and the next Government can do better for all of its people and produce much more fairness.

It is key that we get more people into work, abolish long-term unemployment among our young people and those over the age of 25, and ensure that we have an economy with more productivity leading to rises in wages and higher living standards for all. We need an economy that is based more on exports and investment than on the racking up of public and private debt that this Government have presided over.

I believe that there is a better way, and that the people of this country will vote for it on 7 May. The hon. Member for Peterborough (Mr Jackson) talked about fear. As we approach this critical general election, we should remember the words of Franklin Roosevelt in his inauguration speech of 1932. He said:

“The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”

I do not believe that the British people will be fearful on 7 May. I believe that they will be purposeful in voting out this Government, in voting for change and in voting for a Labour Government.