Economic Update

Yvette Cooper Excerpts

Tuesday 17th March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Rishi Sunak]

I very much appreciate the strains that business cash flows are under, which is why, today, we have already taken steps with the announcement of new cash grants of £10,000, £25,000 and an extension of the business rate holiday to thousands more businesses.

[Yvette Cooper (Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford) (Lab)]

The health action that is being put in place is essential to save lives, but does the Chancellor accept that that also means that some of the jobs that are going this week and the redundancies that are being made will not come back in a hurry, because many hospitality, leisure and tourism jobs simply cannot be done at a social distance? Does he accept that there is a gap between the employment support package that he is rightly working on, I hope, as fast as possible and the welfare support that is simply not adequate for the huge numbers of people who are going to be urgently losing their jobs and who will be terrified of losing their homes as well?

[Rishi Sunak]

We have strengthened the security and the safety net for those in that situation, but the right hon. Lady is right that we are urgently working on measures to do more.