5,731 spoken contributions under 12 words (interjections such as “Will the hon. Member give way?”) are hidden. Show them

1. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Dr Andrew Murrison

   Northern Ireland Troubles: Legacy and Reconciliation

   The Secretary of State has spoken of additional protections in his legislation. Why does he think that Operation Banner veterans, some of whom I represent, remain unconvinced and troubled? Why does he think that the Irish Prime Minister believes there are no additional protections? While he is about it, can he do something to reassure veterans who are feeling very unhappy about this situation, perhaps along the lines of saying categorically that no former terrorists or members of proscribed organisations will serve on the legacy commission?

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2. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Dr Andrew Murrison

   UK-EU Common Understanding Negotiations

   The intentions behind the Erasmus scheme are unobjectionable, but £570 million is an awful lot of money, so I am very pleased that there will be a review after 10 months. Will that review include an assessment of the scheme against what happened in the past, which was essentially to provide a benefit for predominantly middle-class humanities university students, and will he ensure that the opportunity costs to further education, which is tasked with upskilling our young people from a different demographic, are adequately taken into account?

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3. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Dr Andrew Murrison

   National Insurance Contributions (Employer Pensions Contributions) Bill

   I am grateful to the Minister for arguing for more money for the Royal Air Force, and I very much hope that his colleagues in the Ministry of Defence and the Treasury are listening. We were told a little over a year ago that we had wiped the slate clean and that the Government would not be coming back to demand more money to fill various non-existent black holes. What has changed over the past several months that means he is now coming back to levy this very large sum of money?

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4. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Dr Andrew Murrison

   Window Cleaning Industry: Workplace Safety

   On 6 April last year, my constituent Jason Knight was cleaning the last window of the home of a regular customer in Westbury when he was electrocuted by 33,000 V from an overhead cable. He was blown 7 feet across the garden, waking up on a patch of scorched grass with catastrophic injuries. Found by his customer, he was airlifted to hospital in Bristol in 12 minutes and placed in a coma. He woke up surrounded by his distraught family. He was very lucky to survive. Jason was left with life-changing injuries. He has lost his left arm below the elbow, several toes, and a great deal of leg musculature. He has undergone over 20 sets of surgical intervention, suffered severe burns all over his body, and can walk or stand only with the utmost difficulty. Now he is losing his sight as a delayed effect of the electrocution. He is just 34 years old with three small children. He had started his own business that was growing and he was providing for his young family. He is a real doer, but his injuries are such that it is going to be extremely difficult for him to work again. What happened was this: 33,000 V leapt, without physical contact, about 2 metres from an overhead power cable to Jason’s telescopic water-fed cleaning pole. The Health and Safety Executive made inquiries, of course, but concluded there was no breach of regulations that warranted investigation. Indeed, an HSE spokesperson told the BBC that the overhead powerlines involved in this incident met national safety standards. In the UK, we tolerate high tension power cables that are slung surprisingly close to commercial and residential buildings. However, it was not the overhead powerlines that failed Jason; it was the cleaning pole. As Jason said to his father, John, shortly before he was taken to theatre to have his forearm amputated, “I don’t understand, Dad—I bought an insulated pole.” It should not have mattered that he was close to a power line, because the pole should have been fully insulated, but it was not. Jason was using a telescopic pole that could extend and retract. The handle section at the bottom was insulated, but the extended section was not. He was electrocuted when he reached up to retract the extended section. I have to say that before Jason came to see me, I knew very little about window cleaning. As he and John recounted the story, I assumed that it was the water from the water-fed pole that was the culprit, since tap water, being impure, conducts electricity perfectly well. Jason and his dad put me right: window cleaners, including Jason that day, use pure water, or what is often called “zero water.” This kind of water has been filtered to remove all or nearly all dissolved solids, so that it leaves no watermarks on windows after cleaning. Ordinary tap water does not have that property. At that moment, I realised why my own attempts at window cleaning at home invariably left the glass looking worse. The crucial point is this: pure water is non-conductive, so the water in Jason’s pole was not the culprit. What caused this accident was inadequate insulation in a tool designed to be used at height, even in proximity to overhead power lines. This is not a new, unforeseeable risk. The first water-fed poles, developed in the United States in the 1950s, were made entirely of aluminium. When window cleaners started to be electrocuted, the manufacturers simply slapped on some warning labels. At that time, the greatest hazard to window cleaners in Britain was falling off ladders, but when pole technology crossed the pond in the 1990s, its safety issues came with it. One British manufacturer, Craig Mawlam, head of Ionic Systems in Swindon—whose expertise I have drawn on extensively—recognised that danger early. He sought out non-conductive materials, developing composite glass-fibre and carbon-fibre poles. He prioritised insulation in the handle, and worked with the Health and Safety Executive to introduce training and guidance as the industry moved away from ladders and towards working from terra firma. Critically, however, this was voluntary, not required. There was, and remains, no mandatory British standard governing the electrical insulation of telescopic cleaning poles.

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5. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Dr Andrew Murrison

   Window Cleaning Industry: Workplace Safety

   The hon. Gentleman is, of course, quite right. Occupations that are not predictable are particularly dangerous. Agriculture is clearly one, as is construction, and window cleaning is plainly another. The window cleaning industry, as its association will say, is a particular issue, because many in the industry are essentially start-ups. They are often one-man bands—they are usually men—and they do not necessarily undergo training. They are probably not aware of the need for it. That is why it is so important to make the changes that I am suggesting we make, and to engineer out the problem so that people are not exposed to the hazards that I have mentioned and to which, sadly, Jason has fallen victim. The omission of any recognition of the issue in British standards matters now more than ever, because the poles that I have described are no longer specialist equipment; they are used everywhere. They are used on residential streets beneath overhead cables; they are used near rail infrastructure; they are used in airports, hospitals, schools and industrial sites. They are used not just for window cleaning but, increasingly, for solar panel cleaning, gutter clearing, roof treatment, camera inspections, and building maintenance. They are available online relatively inexpensively, and they are available for use by amateurs and DIY-ers. Moreover, they are increasingly imported cheaply from overseas, especially from China, meeting no enforceable UK electrical safety standards at all. In 2011, a British standard was published that could have changed everything: BS 8020. This standard governs insulating hand tools used near live electrical conductors up to 1,000 V. It requires rigorous construction standards. It requires batch testing at 10,000 V, providing a 10:1 safety margin. It mandates clear marking and verification. As an example, it covers narrow bladed shovels that might be used close to where underground cables could be—they are the ones sold at builders’ merchants or DIY shops, typically with a yellow or orange plastic section in the shaft or handle. Some pole manufacturers chose to apply BS 8020 to the handle section of their poles. Since 2017, at least one UK supplier has done so as a matter of course: Ionic Systems in Swindon, Wiltshire. But here lies the problem: BS 8020 is not mandatory for cleaning poles, and it does not require insulation of the section immediately above the handle. That is why Jason Knight was injured. The UK remained free of fatal water-fed pole electrocutions until 2022. In that single year, two window cleaners were killed while working at residential properties. In 2024, Jason was very lucky to survive. Window cleaners now account for a significant proportion of overhead powerline electrocutions, yet unlike in agriculture, construction or scaffolding, there is no targeted awareness campaign, no mandatory training requirement and no enforced equipment standards for this trade. That is why I have brought this matter to the House. The Federation of Window Cleaners, the Health and Safety Executive, the British Standards Institute and representatives of the energy networks have begun discussions on what to do. Some suppliers have engaged constructively, but others have refused entirely. The manufacturer of the pole that Jason was using when he was electrocuted claims that its products are “tested to 5,000 V”, without reference to any recognised standard. That figure is arbitrary; it is meaningless without methodology, certification, or context. A pole tested informally to 5,000 V may be vastly less safe than one certified to British standard 8020 to 1,000 V but good for 10,000 V with a 10:1 safety margin, yet the higher number sounds more reassuring to a sole trader or DIY-er choosing equipment online. That is exactly why British standards exist, and why we need one for telescopic water-fed poles. This debate is not about banning water-fed poles. They have made the industry safer, because they have reduced the need to use ladders and to work at height. Nor is it about blaming workers, many of whom are sole traders operating on tight margins, without access to formal training or industry bodies. This debate is about designing danger out of tools in the first place, not just warning people to be careful while continuing to sell sub-optimal equipment. The remedy is simple, proportionate, cheap and immediately available. First, British standard 8020 should be amended or extended to cover telescopic cleaning poles explicitly, and to require that both the handle and the first telescopic section above it meet the insulation standard and are marked accordingly. That single change would ensure that an operator’s hands remain on verifiably insulated material throughout normal raising, lowering and operation of the pole. It would create a safe clearance of 3 metres to 4 metres in most real-world situations. Secondly, compliance with the standard should be mandatory, whether through regulation, conditions attached to limited liability insurance, or the procurement requirements imposed by major building occupiers. It is worth admitting that products would become about 70 grams heavier and slightly less rigid, but that is completely tolerable. On the flip side, glass-fibre insulation is cheaper than the carbon fibre it would replace. I am pleased to say that the British Standards Institution, after a bit of encouragement, has seen the merit of the case. Its director general, Scott Steedman, kindly wrote to me earlier this month to say that he is working up proposals that will determine if there will be an amendment to the relevant British standards, drawing from the guidance published by the British Window Cleaning Academy. However, I remain concerned that the right British standard is amended. BS 8020 is an equipment-based British standard. It appears to me to be the more appropriate target, rather than the BSI’s current suggestion, which is BS 8213, a British standard which deals largely with safe systems of work. It could be that both standards need to be amended. Nevertheless, Mr Steedman’s news is most welcome, as is his assurance that a draft of the proposed changes will be published for public consultation in accordance with the BSI’s normal practice. Britain has led the world in industrial safety by setting clear, enforceable standards. Given British manufacturers’ global exports, a UK standard in this could well become an international benchmark, saving lives, limbs and livelihoods across the world. Jason Knight, his father John and Craig Mawlam are not campaigners by choice. They have become campaigners because they do not want what happened to Jason to happen to others, and I pay tribute to them today. We cannot accept a system in which warning labels are seen as a substitute for a simple engineering solution that removes risk at source. I feel sure that the Minister will agree with all this, and I hope he will use his good offices to encourage the BSI and the HSE to bring forward the changes I have outlined as quickly as possible.

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6. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·David Simmonds

   Local Government Finance

   It is no surprise that the Government sought to sneak this consultation out with the minimum level of attention, proposed, as it was, for simply a written ministerial statement at the last possible second. We can all see that poverty is rising, driven by a shrinking economy and rising unemployment, combined with inflation running at 3.6% and higher energy bills. Rising business rates are crippling our businesses, and local communities everywhere are feeling the pressure created by this Government’s choices. How does the settlement help our councils to deal with all that? First, it assumes that working people—all people—will pay higher taxes everywhere. We should not misunderstand the Minister’s words on core spending power. The settlement enshrines an assumption that taxes will rise to the maximum possible extent everywhere, with fees and charges for parking, libraries and everything else following the same trajectory. Even if the inflation target of 2% is reached—which seems unlikely given that it is currently at 3.6%—the increase represents a 1% uplift for local government during the whole life of this Parliament, and that sector was left £1.5 billion worse off by the rise in national insurance contributions alone. Resources at a local level are going backwards. This is a settlement that punishes efficiency, with those councils that deliver the best value for money being raided to bail out the more spendthrift—and I am sure we can guess which parties tend to run those councils. It is a settlement that introduces new, higher taxes on hospitality—voted for by every party in this Chamber besides the Conservatives—bearing down on investment and opportunity. It brings in a homes tax on more expensive homes—money that goes to the Treasury, not councils. In the Red Book, that is estimated to cost the Government a net £335 million due to the damage it does to the housing market. Only this hapless Labour Government could bring in new taxes that actually cost the Treasury money—and here they go again. This settlement repeats the fallacy that poverty is the only driver of council costs. The average English local authority delivers more than 800 different services. Our rural coastal areas, and anywhere else with lots of retirees, face the high costs of adult social care but do not necessarily score highly on indices of deprivation, despite the costs being driven by statutory duties. The undertaker Prime Minister is ushering many councils towards their financial doom. As this Government hammer Wychavon and Stratford-on-Avon, they are also hammering Ashfield, Dartford, Burnley, Cambridge, Hyndburn, Lichfield and Bolsover, which are among the places worst hit by this financial settlement. The Government’s detachment from the consequences of their actions is striking, and all while the Prime Minister and the Chancellor dodge the new high-value council tax in their grace and favour accommodation. All this is behind the smoke and mirrors that disguise from our local authorities the financial impact. They have been required to carry out their public budget consultations without having had sight of the impact of this settlement. Let me conclude with some straightforward questions. Will the Minister tell the House when our locally elected brethren will learn the net impact of this settlement on their council tax budgets? When will we debate the impact of the Government’s cuts to SEND capital funding? When will the House have the opportunity to scrutinise their decision to impose exceptional financial support or higher council tax rises to bail out the consequences of their decisions? When will they provide clarity on the impact of their SEND proposals on council budgets? How will the Government use the budgets allocated to the new devolution areas and now snatched back to mitigate the impact of their decisions? Will the Minister admit to the House that this is a tax-raising, job-destroying, housing-hobbling, rate-raising, service-slashing, community-crippling, election-cancelling settlement that fails even on its intended purpose of shunting resources to politically favoured areas?

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7. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·David Mundell

   Engagements

   On Sunday at Arlington cemetery, I will have the honour of joining the families and friends of many of the victims of the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie on 21 December 1988—the worst terrorist atrocity in the United Kingdom. Does the Prime Minister agree with me that, especially after all these years, those families and friends deserve both truth and justice, and will the United Kingdom Government continue to do all they can to bring about that outcome?

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8. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·David Mundell

   INEOS Chemicals: Grangemouth

   It would be wrong not to commend the hon. Member for Alloa and Grangemouth (Brian Leishman) on this announcement as he has always been such a strong advocate for jobs at Grangemouth. Indeed, owing to his willingness to speak out against his Government, he lost the Labour Whip. I noted from the photographs issued around today’s launch that workers at Grangemouth did not seem overly happy to see the Chancellor. Perhaps that was because they know that her policies, which continue to attack the oil and gas industry—particularly through the windfall tax—are leading to the undermining of the oil and gas industry across Scotland.

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9. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Damian Hinds

   Housing Development: Cumulative Impacts

   I beg to move, That this House has considered the cumulative impacts of housing development.  It is good to see you presiding once again, Mr Twigg. Let me start with the obvious statement that in this country, and in all of our localities, we need more housing. There has been population growth, and in our constituencies we want there to be customers for shops and people to work in them, and places for people growing up locally to be able to move into. We also recognise that people move, which is important for labour mobility. Part of the population growth is about net immigration, but a big part is about increasing longevity—people living longer—and part of the need for more housing is the tendency of people to live in smaller households. Overall, the record of housing delivery for both Labour and Conservative Governments has had its ups and downs. Both Labour and Conservative Governments suffered from major disruptions—in the case of Labour, the crash of 2007-08, and in the case of the Conservatives, covid-19. However, the peak of the modern era in net additions to housing was the 249,000 achieved just before covid under a Conservative Government, against the peak of 224,000 under Labour just before the crash. The target the new Government have in place is one that has not been achieved since the 1970s, and they are falling far short right now. The provisional number for 2024-25 is 209,000, which is a 6% fall on the previous year of 2023-24. There are aspects of what the Minister outlined in his announcement yesterday that could help to address the shortfall, but I believe that it is inconsistent with the way that the formula currently skews development towards rural areas. What do I mean by that skew and how does it come about? Overall, the Government require a 50% uplift in housing numbers, but in the 58 mainly or largely rural local authorities, the average increase was 70%. In East Hampshire, which I represent, the target doubled, from 575 a year to 1,100. Meanwhile, urban and major conurbations saw a much lower increase, at around 16% to 17% on average, and quite a few places saw a fall, including much of London and Birmingham. To be clear, that is not correcting a historical imbalance. Looking back over 20 years, the proportionate addition of dwellings per 1,000 households has been greater in predominantly rural areas than in predominantly urban ones. We also know from analysis by the Resolution Foundation that tilting development towards cities is good for economic growth. Why is it a problem to have a skew towards rural areas? First, let us acknowledge that when we talk about rural land, this is not land that is typically sitting there doing nothing. It is not idle; often, it is farmland. Of course, these days we are more acutely conscious than ever of the necessity for food security. It is also the home for nature, and important to biodiversity. The countryside is an amenity for everyone, whether they live in the countryside or in a town. We will be back in Westminster Hall tomorrow to debate the legacy and significance of Jane Austen. The countryside of the constituency that I represent is what inspired Jane to write her great novels, and it still brings many people to the area. Yes, there are protected areas of countryside, but it is not only about areas of outstanding natural beauty or national parks—the majority of rural areas are not in one—nor is it about the green belt. In East Hampshire there is a lot of green, but there is no green belt. We have a further complication, in that the district of East Hampshire is shared in Parliament between myself and my hon. Friend the Member for Farnham and Bordon (Gregory Stafford). The South Downs national park represents 26% or 27% of pre-existing housing and population in the district, but represents only 15% of housing completions in East Hampshire since it came into being. That creates extra pressure just outside the national park, in places such as Alton Holybourne, Four Marks and Medstead, which I will come back to, and in Horndean, Clanfield and parts of Rowlands Castle. The Minister and I have had an opportunity to discuss this issue previously and I am grateful to him for his constructive engagement with it. I think that East Hampshire district council is right to assume that in the future there will be a split in housing development, reflecting where the pre-existing population and housing were. There is a 74% and 26% split. However, the council cannot do that for affordability. Unaffordability is significantly more acute inside the national park than outside it. However, I am not here today to talk about the national park primarily, because the bigger problem that is driving these issues is the total target. We now also have effects of the duty to co-operate. It is possible that even with that split between 74% and 26%, the part of East Hampshire that is outside the national park might still get asked by the part that is inside the national park to take on more of its burden, and it is obliged to engage in those discussions constructively. However, we also now have other nearby authorities asking East Hampshire, and by the way a couple of other more rural authorities, to take on more of their housing numbers. So, we have this crazy situation whereby, with all the targets having gone up, people are looking to a district such as the one I represent to take more of their housing. But I should also say that none of those authorities have had an increase in their housing target as large as the one that East Hampshire has had. We also have looming over us the effect of local government reorganisation. I think that some people see local government reorganisation—the merging of districts and boroughs into larger unitary authorities—as an opportunity and a way to address some of these problems. I fear that that might be a false hope. In fact, the creation of these large authorities might deepen or even embed some of these issues, with more housing being moved into countryside that will then be lost forever. I will briefly give a case study of one area; it is not the only area where this situation applies, but it is a particularly striking example. It is Four Marks and Medstead. There is a grouping called Four Marks and South Medstead—it is called that in the planning document—and it is in tier three in the settlement hierarchy. It has already had a great deal of housing development. In the 2014 local plan, Four Marks and South Medstead had 2,030 houses and the target in the plan for the period to 2028 was 175 houses. The total number of new houses that have been built since 2014 is in fact 592, which is three times the original target. However, with further permissions and applications, there could be a great deal more houses. Indeed, there could be up to eight times the target and a two-thirds increase in the size of the settlement, and we even hear of further applications on top of all that. What are the effects of that extra development? It takes a lot for a single housing development to change a local environment, but cumulatively a number of smaller developments can change the whole character of an area, which is at odds with paragraph 187 of the NPPF. And this is not just about character and landscape. It is also about practical matters, such as the A31 and being able to turn right on to it, or the capacity of the waste water treatment plant and the electricity substation at Alton. I have talked about Four Marks and South Medstead. In the other part of the parish of Medstead, Medstead village itself and its surroundings are in tier four in the settlement hierarchy. There was no specific target for it in the plan, because Medstead village was put together with other villages. However, I have seen speculative applications for a number of sites in that area, particularly in the new land availability assessment. So why is cumulative impact not being considered in all these developments and proposals? The main time that cumulative development is taken into account is, of course, at the time of plan-making. With speculative developments, when the cumulative effect is not considered, there is a risk that the developments do not meet the economic, social and environmental objectives set out in paragraph 8 of the NPPF. The East Hampshire district local plan was adopted in 2014 for the period up to 2028, and the update process started in 2018. There have been some delays, including most notably as a result of covid. The key point is that under the old, pre-2024 housing targets, East Hampshire had a five-year housing land supply and the 5% buffer. We then got a rapid doubling of the housing targets. There is now no five-year housing land supply—there is a 2.9-year housing land supply. Given that we have doubled it, the only way we could still have a five-year land supply is if we had previously had a 10-year land supply, and I doubt that many local authorities can say that. That is why, although I am talking about East Hampshire, other colleagues may mention other areas; East Hampshire is clearly not alone. Since the big increases in a number of the targets for different areas, I understand that most councils do not have both an up-to-date local plan and the five-year housing land supply. Speculative development is therefore probably happening in lots of places around the country, but it is especially concentrated in our rural areas, because they have had the biggest increases in targets. East Hampshire is currently developing its new local plan. It expects to reach regulation 19 stage in the summer of 2026 and for the plan to be operational in August the following year. Until the local plan is finalised, the tilted balance principle means that the council is required to approve sites unless they can be said to be not sustainable development—a high bar indeed. Each application can be considered only on its own merits and in relation to its individual impact on traffic, sewerage and the rest of it. The council cannot consider the cumulative effect of, say, five smaller developments that might together be the equivalent of one big one. It cannot say, “Because we have already allowed these four, we are not going to allow the fifth.” While I have the floor, I want to mention something that I have mentioned in passing to the Minister before: that the way the formula works does not encourage a change in the housing mix towards more actually affordable homes. To be clear, in areas like mine, we want more affordable homes. When I say “affordable”, I mean it in both senses of the word. What I call “capital-A Affordable” is the sense known to the public sector: social rent and part ownership. There is also “affordable” in the common English sense of the word—the affordability of housing as it is often expressed to us by our constituents in our surgeries, which is to say homes that young families can afford. Although not everybody does, most aspire to home ownership; I would wager that most hon. Members in the Grand Committee Room today had that aspiration to become home owners and did so.

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10. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Damian Hinds

    Housing Development: Cumulative Impacts

    I know the hon. Gentleman’s constituency quite well—he is my mother-in-law’s MP. I know what a fantastic and beautiful area it is, as well as some of the challenges with the local economy. He makes a very good point.

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11. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Damian Hinds

    Housing Development: Cumulative Impacts

    Of course, I agree. It is sometimes frustrating to talk to people who say there is no link between aggregate supply and the price of housing. Of course there is, but there is also the question of the mix, which is what I want to come to. Other things being equal, the best returns for developers tend to be on larger, costlier homes, and new builds are generally more expensive than the existing stock of housing. In East Hampshire, the median price of the current housing stock is an expensive £430,000, but the median price of new houses is £530,000. With development and the increase in stock at a local level, median house prices therefore go up. The formula then calls for more of the same because of how it measures and treats affordability, so it becomes a cycle in which we still do not get the lower-cost homes we need. It could even be said that developers have an incentive to keep the unaffordability ratio increasing, because that extends the pipeline further into the future. I ask Ministers to look again to create incentives for quality, lower-priced housing. I have three straightforward, reasonable asks of the Minister. The first and most important is, of course, to rebalance the formula away from rural—not so there is no rural, but so the balance is right and we do not have targets that mean an unrealistic amount is put into the countryside. It is about having that balance, which requires changing the formula. I asked that of the Minister yesterday, and he was good enough to give me a pithy and clear single-word answer, which was no. I get that, unless and until it changes, the policy is what the policy is, so the answer is no. However, I ask him to reflect further and think about it, not to conflict with Government policy but to complement and support Government policy. A change in the formula—moving back towards the urban, from the rural—would actually support what he is trying to do, including the spirit of what he outlined in yesterday’s statement. My second ask is to change the way the formula works on affordability, to remove the perverse affordability factor I mentioned. Affordability looms large in the overall formula, as it has had its weighting increased, but this is specifically about removing the perverse effect I just mentioned, whereby building more actually makes an area more unaffordable in the eyes of the formula, which therefore increases the target. I think the Minister will say that local authorities can do that in their plan making, but we need it to be systematised to find a way to require a change in the mix of housing so that we get homes that are more in reach of people growing up in rural areas. Finally, in the meantime, as the targets have increased so much and so quickly—the five-year housing land supply in many areas could not possibly have increased nearly so quickly—we have a lot of speculative development. Therefore, pending the change in the formula, will the Minister give guidance stating that local authorities should consider the cumulative impact of all developments together?

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12. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Damian Hinds

    Housing Development: Cumulative Impacts

    The Minister is very good to give way; I thank him. To be clear, when I was talking about the mix, I was not talking solely or even mainly about the tenure mix, but about the price points and the way that the formula works—he gets the point.

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13. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Damian Hinds

    Housing Development: Cumulative Impacts

    I will write to the Minister in more detail—but if, in adding to the stock, we raise the median house price, that has an adverse effect on affordability. We get this ironic situation where the more we build, the less affordable it looks.

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14. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Damian Hinds

    Housing Development: Cumulative Impacts

    I thank the Minister for his considered remarks and for his constructive approach to date—the cumulative effect, one might say, of the Minister’s approach. However, I hope that after today he will think further. The Government should issue guidance to local authorities to the effect that, at least in circumstances where they face huge increases in their housing targets in short order, and it is not viable or realistic to suddenly have a five-year land supply available, they should be able to consider the cumulative impact of speculative developments that come along. The Government should also change the way the target itself is set, so that we get the affordable homes we need, but with the totals rebalanced among local authorities—back towards urban areas and away somewhat from rural ones—so that we end up with reasonable and realistic targets for East Hampshire and areas like it. That would be entirely consistent with—indeed supportive of—what the Government are trying to do on overall housing supply, but it would be a sustainable way of providing the services and infrastructure that people need, fostering community, promoting economic growth, and maintaining the public amenity and productive capacity of our countryside. I conclude, as others have, in the spirit of the season by wishing you, Mr Twigg, all colleagues from across the House, and House staff a very happy Christmas. Question put and agreed to. Resolved, That this House has considered the cumulative impacts of housing development.

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15. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Dame Harriett Baldwin

    UK-EU Common Understanding Negotiations

    Could the Minister just spell out for the House’s benefit how much taxpayers’ money he has signed up to spending next year and in every year of this Parliament? On where Members of Parliament can read about value for money, which line item of the Budget has this money come out of?

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16. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Dame Caroline Dinenage

    Membership-based Charity Organisations

    I beg to move, That this House has considered Government support for membership-based charity organisations. It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Twigg. Membership organisations play a central role in protecting and enhancing the things that we consider important to our national character. The great British countryside is maintained and safeguarded for future generations by conservation charities such as the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, the Wildlife Trusts and the Woodland Trust. The most iconic landscapes, sold around the world as the backdrop of British soft power—reminding visitors of the iconic settings for Jane Austen, Dickens and Harry Potter, as well as the paintings of Constable and Turner—are kept open to the public by membership charities such as the Youth Hostels Association and the Canal and River Trust. Speaking of Turner and Constable, membership charities are the stewards of our country’s heritage. They look after the artefacts, artworks and architecture that make us proud to be British. Between them, charities such as the National Gallery, Tate, the National Trust and English Heritage have millions of members. If I were to ask everyone in this room and in this building whether they have ever been a member of one of these charities, I would be surprised if anyone could say truthfully that they had not. The National Trust, for example, has nearly 6 million members. English Heritage and the RSPB have 1.2 million each. Those are numbers that political parties can only dream of.

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17. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Dame Caroline Dinenage

    Membership-based Charity Organisations

    The hon. Gentleman has done beautifully to put that on the record. He is absolutely right that these incredible membership charities preserve our national heritage. If we were to ask people why they support such charities, I expect they would not say that they do so just to get access to some of the venues and the fantastic historic treasures they promote. They would probably say that they value the mission of those charities, whether conserving the countryside, protecting our heritage or serving the vulnerable. They want to support those missions; they are members because they value what those organisations do. In doing those things, the charities provide significant benefits to the Government. All told, the voluntary sector delivers £14 billion of public services to the Government and directly contributes £70 billion to the UK economy. Much of that is delivered by membership organisations. All that is without mentioning the indirect benefits that many membership-based charities provide: for example the health benefits to the public of maintaining hundreds of thousands of hectares of land, the demonstrable mental health impact of engaging with arts and culture, and all the educational enrichment they offer. But all that is under threat. Charities are under more strain than ever. It is a question of time and money. Telegraph readers were recently outraged that the National Trust, in order to save on costs, is replacing homemade scones—however one prefers to pronounce them—at some of its properties, but this is just the tip of the iceberg, or the jam on top of the cream, depending on which way one prefers one’s scones. Billions of pounds of additional financial pressure has been put on charities at a time when the demand for their services is rising and income streams are drying up. The biggest impact, as we know, is through national insurance contribution changes, which have collectively added £1.4 billion to the charity sector’s bills, but our art institutions are set to see huge rises to their business rates as well, and many heritage organisations have seen the cost of maintenance far outstrip inflation. Meanwhile, so many are seeing demand for their services skyrocketing. The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, for example, tells me that rescues are operating at 120% of their capacity, and Cats Protection says that, in the last three years, it has seen a 71% increase in the number of cats being abandoned. The wider trend is clear. Around 83% of charities recorded an increase in demand for their services over the last 12 months, but even those pressures might be bearable were it not for the fact that the stability of the funding model itself is being called into question. Fewer people are donating to charity, and while the average donation is increasing, this highlights the narrowing of the base from which membership charities can secure funds. Those donations are not coming from the places one might expect, such as the wealthy London constituencies of Kensington and Bayswater, Chelsea and Fulham or Holborn and St Pancras, all of which form the three least generous constituencies as a percentage of their income in the UK. In real terms, the amount donated by British businesses has declined as well, with the number of FTSE 100 companies donating more than 1% of their profits falling by 14%. Money is not the only thing that charities rely on; they rely on people donating their time. However, long-term trends in hours spent volunteering are in decline as well—from 45% in 2013-14 to 28% in 2024-25. People put that down to a whole range of things, such as the bureaucracy and paperwork involved in volunteering and the cost of living pressures that people are under. I will not attempt to understate it: this is a full-blown crisis in the charity sector. It is no wonder a majority of charity leaders say they would not be confident that they would be able to cope if they saw a decline in their income streams. However, and I know the Minister is aware of this, a decline in their income streams is exactly what we will discuss today, and it is why I asked for this debate. Membership charities at the moment are able to claim gift aid on memberships that are currently deemed donations by the Government. That settlement is a direct expression of the way that charity members regard their relationship with charities. It is one of the supports that people can give to the aims and the work of the fantastic charities, many of which I have already discussed. They are not private services; their work supports the public good and, in many cases, saves a lot of money for the Government. I know that the Government see it that way too and the Minister will tell me how much he values the work of membership charities and how much store the Government put into that value, but the truth is that the Government have been very slow to tweak well-meaning and necessary consumer protection legislation despite the imminent impact of the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024 on membership charities’ cashflows. Fundamentally, the Act alters the way that membership charities process memberships and the benefits of them, leading to a potentially huge loss in revenues at a time when charities’ finances are already overstretched. The provisions of the Act move us away from a place where we view a charity membership as an expression of support. If, for the purposes of the DMCCA, refundable memberships are no longer considered to be donations due to the Government insisting on applying a 14-day cooling off period, the result is that gift aid can no longer be claimed. Let me provide a bit of perspective on that: national insurance contributions added more than £10 million to the National Trust’s wage bill. That has been devastating. Gift aid is worth five times that for the National Trust. The story is the same for English Heritage, on which I must declare an interest as I am a member. While it has seen a £1.7 million cost increase due to national insurance contributions, the impact of losing gift aid on their memberships would be more than five times that—valued at around £10 million. I am no fortune teller, but I have an idea of what the Minister might say. She might say the Government have issued guidance that means membership charities will continue to be able to claim gift aid. But the fact is, as things currently stand, that is not what the law says, and that is creating confusion not just for the big players but for the small ones as well, because charity practice is currently at odds with the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024 and at odds with consumer law. Due to the widespread confusion of three very conflicting pieces of legislation, the Chartered Institute of Fundraising has written to the Department for Business and Trade. I know that is not the Minister’s Department, but I hope that she will convey this message. The institute has written to the Department offering to draft legal advice for small charities so that the Government can just sign it off, but it has had no response to that letter. Will the Minister speak to her colleagues in the Department for Business and Trade to chase that up, please, because small charities are very worried? Perhaps the lack of response is because there is no clarity about who is affected. The CIF has told me that even it does not know the exact number of membership charities that could fall foul of the change. What is concerning is that His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs believes that only primary legislation can really sort out the legal contradiction between current consumer law, charity practice and the provisions of the DMCCA. Again, I do not want to put words in the Minister’s mouth, but I expect she might tell me that the Government have committed to passing legislation about this in the future. However, we know that the wheels of Government can move quite slowly, so when she says that, she probably means establishing certainty for charities by 2027 at the earliest, but it needs to be sooner than that. So, working with colleagues across Government, can the Minister find a suitable legislative vehicle to provide the certainty that the Government say they want? I am not asking her to do anything the Government have not already articulated a need for. And that has to start with reconvening the roundtable of membership charities that was cancelled due to the reshuffle. I would welcome that being reconvened, and I know the sector would, too. Will the Minister commit to that today? Membership charities have told me that the best possible solution lies in classifying charitable memberships as excluded contracts in secondary legislation. In recognition of their unique nature, their charitable membership should be placed in that category. It would be helpful if the Minister could confirm that today if she can. It is not unprecedented. Streaming subscription services, for example, have been given waivers from the 14-day cooling-off period. Membership charities should at least be able to expect the same support as users of streaming subscription services. I will give an example of how this could work perversely for membership charities. Why should someone buy membership of something like the National Gallery? It has sell-out exhibitions such as the very popular Van Gogh exhibition. We could potentially buy ourselves membership, skip the queue, be able to get into sell-out exhibitions, receive a discount for the ticket while we are at it, and then cancel the membership once we have seen the exhibition and received an almost total refund. The same could be said of the National Trust or English Heritage sites. As things stand, I could purchase membership, visit half a dozen sites for free over a week’s holiday, and then cancel my membership for almost a total refund. English Heritage told me that its membership works out at around 22p a day. Is that the rate at which the membership charity should reimburse a departing member? Will the Minister say on what basis she wants charities to offer proportionate refunds in such instances? If not, maybe she could commit to giving membership charities the freedom to calculate themselves what a proportional refund might look like. The National Trust believes, for example, that based on current guidance alone, every 1% of its membership that takes advantage of the loophole will lose it £3 million. Even if a tiny number of its members takes advantage of the new loophole in the law, that is a huge and significant impact on its finances, and that means less money spent on its core mission, which is to conserve our heritage. We expect our charities to do so much. They provide so much for our nation and they do it really well. But membership charities need a vote of support from the Government now. They need this albatross removed from around their necks. And in light of the billions of pounds of tax rises that charities have already seen, there is an incentive for the Government to provide legal clarity. I hope that that is what the Minister will be able to provide in her remarks today.

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18. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Dame Caroline Dinenage

    Membership-based Charity Organisations

    I am grateful to the Minister for her response. I am also grateful to her for advocating on my behalf, and on behalf of membership charities, with the Department for Business and Trade on the issue, which we have been wrestling with today, of trying to get clarity about the roundtable and the response to the letter. The Minister talked about the Government carefully considering, but what the sector needs is action. It needs certainty and clarity, and it needs them fast. The Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act will start impacting them next year, and they cannot wait till 2027 for this to be solved. They are facing a perfect storm: the real unintended consequences of the national insurance rises, which are impacting charities and the amazing work they do, and now the impact of the Act. The Government say that they care deeply about this issue, but they need to follow up those words with action. I am grateful to the Minister for helping to try to deliver that action. When she advocates for us with DBT, she needs to be in the room. The silos of Government and things falling between the stools are one of the biggest issues in trying to resolve these issues for charities, which our constituents and our country depend on. Question put and agreed to. Resolved, That this House has considered Government support for membership-based charity organisations.

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19. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Caroline Nokes

    National Insurance Contributions (Employer Pensions Contributions) Bill

    Order. I will make exactly the same point I made yesterday. Yesterday’s debate was about the Finance Bill, and this debate is on the National Insurance Contributions (Employer Pensions Contributions) Bill. It is not on the two-child cap or on spending commitments.

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20. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Caroline Nokes

    National Insurance Contributions (Employer Pensions Contributions) Bill

    As there are no further Back-Bench contributions, I call the shadow Minister.

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21. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Caroline Nokes

    National Insurance Contributions (Employer Pensions Contributions) Bill

    Order. Before I call the Minister, I want to put on the record that the behaviour I have seen on both Front Benches this evening has been about the worst I have ever witnessed. The debate should take place across the Dispatch Box, not from a sedentary position. [Interruption.] No—not “He started it!” This is not a classroom.

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22. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Bradley Thomas

    Local Government Finance

    Talking about local government finance, I was shocked to read in The Times yesterday that Reform-led Worcestershire county council has sought permission from the Government to increase council tax by a maximum 10%. Will the Minister take this opportunity to rule that out, and will she tell us if Labour is in cahoots with Reform to whack up council tax?

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23. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Bob Blackman

    Northern Ireland Troubles: Legacy and Reconciliation

    Notwithstanding the fact that the Secretary of State has said that the chances of a successful prosecution are very limited indeed, the punishment is in the process of investigation and trial in the first place. Will the Secretary of State look sympathetically at appropriate amendments to the Bill to make sure that the bar is raised very high, so that it is almost impossible for one of our brave veterans to be prosecuted in our courts?

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24. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Blake Stephenson

    Local Government Finance

    May I welcome the focus on reducing deprivation in this statement? How confident is the Minister that deprivation in rural areas will not be missed in the funding formula? I should refer Members to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests, because I am still a councillor on Central Bedfordshire council. That council is looking at having to find more than £20 million to balance its budget. That will be a real struggle in central Bedfordshire, which is a high-growth area with high needs and a lot of spending. Will the Minister commit to meet with me and local council leaders to discuss the unique circumstances in central Bedfordshire and what can be done to alleviate the financial pressures and to support them in balancing their budget?

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25. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Aphra Brandreth

    Puberty Suppressants Trial

    Children struggling with gender dysphoria and their families are trying to find their way through very difficult and often distressing times. We should be helping them, not experimenting on them. Should we not be following the example of other European countries, such as Denmark and Finland, which have shifted their policies towards counselling rather than medical interventions?

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26. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Andrew Bowie

    INEOS Chemicals: Grangemouth

    I thank the Minister for the advance copy of his statement. The steps announced today by the Government to secure the ethylene plant at Grangemouth are welcome news, especially for the workers at the site who can now look forward to the new year, assured that their jobs will remain at the strategically vital site—and Grangemouth is vital, as the UK’s last plant producing ethylene, a key ingredient in plastics used in advanced manufacturing and the automotive and aerospace sectors. To have lost domestic production capacity for such a core product would have been unconscionable. However, this move, welcome as it is, demonstrates just how exposed sites such as Grangemouth have become under this Government. This Government’s policies are leading to the deindustrialisation of this country, with unemployment rates soaring and the economy shrinking as a result. From potteries in Stoke to the Prax Lindsey oil refinery in Lincolnshire and, most obviously and glaringly, our oil and gas industry in the North sea, this Government are not just overseeing but engineering the decline of energy-intensive industries in this country. Of course, I am genuinely glad that 500 jobs at Grangemouth will be protected, but that will be cold comfort for the thousands of workers in and around the wider oil and gas industry who have already lost their jobs, or those who will spend Christmas next week not knowing whether they will have a job next year because of Labour party policy. Last week it was Harbour Energy, and before that it was the Port of Aberdeen, Apache and Petrofac. TotalEnergies has had to merge with NEO NEXT Energy to operate, while Shell has merged with Equinor. Those businesses all say the same thing: the exorbitant taxation regime, increased and extended until 2030, is driving away investment. Couple that with the utterly astronomical cost of energy here in the UK, pushed ever higher by unnecessary green levies and carbon taxes, and it is no surprise that, in his response to today’s announcement, Sir Jim Ratcliffe said that “high energy costs and punitive carbon” taxes were “driving industry out of the UK at an alarming rate. If politicians want jobs, investment and energy security, then they must create a competitive environment.” Week after week, more jobs in the sector are lost and critical national assets shut up shop as a direct consequence of policy decisions made by this Government. Since Labour stepped into office, more than 15,000 manufacturing and industry jobs have been lost—that is the scale of the crisis we are dealing with. Great Britain has a proud manufacturing legacy, but current Government policy towards energy is squandering that legacy, damaging Scottish jobs, and damaging an important national asset. “There are 200,000 jobs in the UK associated with oil and gas, and they are all at risk unless the government changes course.” Those are not my words, Madam Deputy Speaker, but those of the chairman of Ineos at Grangemouth. Today’s announcement is timely, however, as tomorrow I will be visiting Mossmorran to meet the team following the news that the polyethylene plant there will be closing. ExxonMobil’s chairman there has explained that he does not have two of the keys needed for success because of Government policy. He said: “We’ve had windfall taxes, we’ve had a ban on production licences—I need cheap sources of abundant ethane, and I do not have them, because the North Sea—because of Government policy—is declining rapidly…we paid £20 million last year in CO2 taxes, that will double in the next four or five years.” What is shocking, though, is that for some inexplicable reason the Secretary of State for Scotland chose today to attack ExxonMobil when explaining why it was not receiving the same support as Grangemouth, saying that the management “weren’t able to give us a pathway to profitability.” Of course they cannot do that—at every turn this Government are putting up hurdles, shutting down the North sea and taxing these businesses until they burst. Honestly, this Government just do not get it. They are not listening. Today’s announcement does not even scratch the surface when it comes to rectifying the damage and pain that this Government have inflicted on industry in this country. Given that this is the second time this Government have launched an unprovoked attack on a leading investor in the United Kingdom, does the Minister want me to pass on an apology from the Government when I visit Mossmorran tomorrow? Today’s announcement is welcome, but this Government could do so much more. We should scrap the energy profits levy and remove the punitive carbon taxes—we are not getting an exemption to the EU emissions trading scheme anyway, according to the EU Commission. We should incentivise, not punish. A Conservative Government will do all this and more when we return to office in three years’ time—unfortunately, those are three years I do not think British industry has.

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27. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Alison Griffiths

    Digital ID System

    7. What discussions she has had with the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster on introducing a nationwide digital ID system.

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28. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Alison Griffiths

    Digital ID System

    A very happy Christmas to you, Mr Speaker. More than 5,300 of my constituents have signed a petition opposing digital ID, alongside nearly 3 million people nationally. In my own local survey, two thirds opposed it outright. Digital ID did not appear anywhere in Labour’s manifesto. The Government have no mandate for it and no consent from the public, so when will the Minister explain to the House on what democratic basis the Government believe they are entitled to enact their nationwide digital ID plan?

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29. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Alex Burghart

    Northern Ireland Troubles: Legacy and Reconciliation

    (Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland to make a statement on the draft Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Act 2023 (Remedial) Order 2025.

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30. 17 Dec 2025·Parliament·Alex Burghart

    Northern Ireland Troubles: Legacy and Reconciliation

    Thank you very much, Mr Speaker, for granting this urgent question, which I have asked because I think there is a very real danger that the Government may be about to break the law. It is very important that the House is aware that the Joint Committee on Human Rights was not in possession of all the facts when it wrote its report. [Interruption.] Last year, the High Court in Belfast found parts of the legacy Act to be incompatible with the European convention on human rights. At the time of the election, the Conservative Government were appealing that highly disputable decision. The incoming Labour Government, for reasons they have never disclosed, chose to drop that appeal, and have subsequently laid a draft remedial order to amend the legislation. The problem is that earlier this year the Northern Ireland Veterans Movement was granted permission to intervene in the case before the Supreme Court. On 15 October, Lord Wolfson KC, acting for the movement, did just that and made written and oral submissions that the Court is now considering. Consequently, it is entirely possible that the declarations of incompatibility relied on by the Secretary of State to lay the remedial order will be quashed. The case is very much live. That is very important, because under section 10 of the Human Rights Act 1998 a Government have the authority to use a remedial order only unless and until all appeals in relation to declarations of incompatibility have been “determined or abandoned”. That test is not met. If the Government decide to push ahead with their remedial order, not only will they be acting ultra vires, but they will be setting a terrible precedent that will mean that future Governments may use remedial orders in ways they were never intended to be used. To avoid that, all the Government need to do is commit to not pushing their remedial order to a vote until the Supreme Court has finally ruled. Will the Secretary of State make that commitment?

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31. 16 Dec 2025·Parliament·Stuart Anderson

    Finance (No. 2) Bill

    Does my hon. Friend agree that farmers across South Shropshire have been devastated by the family farm tax? It is going to impact them far beyond what the Government are even considering, and it will impact national food security.

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32. 16 Dec 2025·Parliament·Sir Roger Gale

    Planning Reform

    We do not have green belt in east Kent. We used to have something called farmland; it is now called blighted land, because it has been zoned for housing, but it is not being built on. House building in east Kent has virtually come to a grinding halt, and houses are not selling as a direct result of this Government’s policies. How many unbuilt-out housing consents have already been granted? Should we not be using those before we start taking further agricultural land for building?

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33. 16 Dec 2025·Parliament·Sir Oliver Dowden

    Planning Reform

    Within a mile of the well-connected stations of Radlett, Cuffley, Borehamwood, Potters Bar and Bushey there is pristine countryside that is treasured by local communities and prevents urban sprawl. The opening up of this green belt to a development free-for-all runs totally contrary to the promises made by the Labour party at the last election. What radius around those stations is envisioned in these proposals, and what will the Minister do to protect the character and integrity of existing villages and towns in my constituency and others up and down the country?

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34. 16 Dec 2025·Parliament·Sir Oliver Dowden

    Finance (No. 2) Bill

    I thank my neighbour. The Minister did not answer this point made by the hon. Member for Angus and Perthshire Glens (Dave Doogan) about the effect of the jobs tax on unemployment. In my constituency, I have met countless businesses that have laid off staff, or have shifted staff to being self-employed. Does he accept, particularly given the unemployment figures today, that there is a direct link between the jobs tax and higher unemployment?

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35. 16 Dec 2025·Parliament·Sir Mel Stride

    Finance (No. 2) Bill

    I beg to move an amendment, to leave out from “That” to the end of the Question and add “this House declines to give a Second Reading to the Finance (No. 2) Bill because the Bill includes provisions breaking the Chancellor of the Exchequer’s promise, given after the Autumn Budget 2024, not to raise taxes, and breaking the Chancellor’s promise at the last Budget that there would be no extension of the freeze in Income Tax and National Insurance thresholds and that, from 2028–29, personal tax thresholds would be uprated in line with inflation once again; because the Bill implements changes to Agricultural Property Relief and Business Property Relief for Inheritance Tax which will devastate family farms, businesses and food security; because the Bill is the result of a Budget that will lead to higher spending and borrowing, while damaging growth and living standards with £26 billion of tax rises; and because this House is opposed to raising taxes on working people to pay for increased welfare spending.” In the middle of Leicester Square, in the heart of our great city, there is a statue of perhaps one of the greatest Englishmen who ever lived: William Shakespeare. In his hand there is a scroll, which reads, in his own words: “there is no darkness but ignorance”. This Government have brought plenty of darkness to our country—indeed, during the run-up to the Budget, we had so many kites flown as to what taxes were going to be put up or not that the sun was blotted out of the sky, and a huge, dark shadow was cast across consumers, who stopped spending, and businesses, which stopped investing and employing people. Don’t take my word for it, Madam Deputy Speaker: the Bank of England itself says precisely that it damaged the economy. Indeed, we have seen this in the latest figures on growth, which the Minister was most eager to tell us about in his speech. For the three months to the end of October, growth in the economy was negative—it was minus 0.1%—which is further evidence of the darkness that this Government have cast upon the animal spirits in our economy. To return to Shakespeare, were he here today, he would be appalled by the ignorance that this Government have shown of the basic rules of economics. It is a basic fact that if you focus on redistribution, as socialists always do—of course, there is always an argument for redistribution—at the expense of getting the incentives right in the economy, you will damage growth. That is exactly what is at the heart of this Budget. The key choice that has been taken is to increase taxes on hard-working people and spend at least a substantial proportion of the money raised on increasing the benefits bill. The second rule that this Government seem incapable of grasping is that if you tax something, you get less of it. That is a simple fact. That brings me to the topic of work. This Finance Bill further freezes the income tax threshold, meaning that 800,000 people or thereabouts will be dragged into the basic rate of income tax, and 1 million or thereabouts will be dragged through fiscal drag into the higher rate of income tax. By 2030, it is estimated that around one in four taxpayers will be in either the higher rate of income tax or the additional rate—an £8 billion tax grab in the target year, rising to £12.7 billion in 2030. That is on top of various other issues that are coming down the track, such as the freezing of the threshold for repayment of student loans, which is effectively a stealth tax on younger people. It is also on top of the freeze in the employer national insurance threshold, which will raise around £1 billion by 2030. Once again, that comes straight out of employers’ pockets—it is a further instalment of the extra jobs tax. All of this will reduce the incentive to work, as we have seen. In an intervention a moment ago, my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley and Ilkley (Robbie Moore) raised this very point in the context of hospitality. We have seen 90,000 jobs destroyed on this Government’s watch—and whose jobs are they? They are predominantly young people’s jobs, because increasing national insurance and reducing the threshold at which that tax kicks in disproportionately impacts those on lower incomes, which includes younger people. Of course, we also have the Employment Rights Bill coming down the track, which will make employing people, particularly younger people, even more risky and expensive. We see in this Finance Bill an outright attack on savers —those who are doing the right thing, putting money by for their retirement—and a 2% increase in taxes on savings income, which the OBR suggests will ironically lead to more people putting cash into individual savings accounts. That is quite the reverse of the effect that the Chancellor is attempting to achieve. According to the OBR, three quarters of the impact of that tax will be borne by working people by way of reduced pension contributions and lower wages. Indeed, the Association of British Insurers says that this measure is “a short-sighted tax grab which will lower pension saving and undermine people’s retirement security.” Then we get to inheritance tax. When we shuffle off this mortal coil—to get back to our friend Shakespeare—there will be a tax charge for those who have the temerity to have left something by way of a pension. It is a £1.5 billion tax grab by the Chancellor on those unused pensions.

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36. 16 Dec 2025·Parliament·Sir Mel Stride

    Finance (No. 2) Bill

    Sadly, I think the gravediggers are still alive and well under this Government. We are seeing that in the destruction of jobs, businesses, farms and livelihoods up and down this country.

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37. 16 Dec 2025·Parliament·Sir Mel Stride

    Finance (No. 2) Bill

    My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. What businesses, including farms, need to succeed is lower taxes and not to be spending most of their time worrying about how they will cover the impact of future taxation. They need to be planning for the future of their businesses and investing in them.

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38. 16 Dec 2025·Parliament·Sir Mel Stride

    Finance (No. 2) Bill

    I would not naturally defer to the results of a Lib Dem survey over the work of His Majesty’s Treasury. However, I get the gist of what the hon. Lady is saying—perhaps a bar chart with a slightly dodgy scale would be a good way of putting the point. The Chancellor says that those who are in receipt solely of the state pension should not worry about being dragged slightly into taxation, because that will be dealt with, but we do not know what that actually means. We do not know what the plan is, nor the cost. Perhaps in the wind-ups the Minister can tell us exactly what is envisaged for the very large number of pensioners who, under the Bill, will be dragged into paying tax on their state pension for the first time. What a mess! The Government are working against the instincts of those who are doing the right thing to save for their future. The same is the case in respect of investment. The 2% increase in tax on dividends—a £1.2 billion tax grab—will simply have the effect of disincentivising investments in equities. That will mean less capital being invested in businesses, which is what drives up productivity. Part of the story of low productivity in our country is the fact that private investment has been too low for too long. This tax increase will weigh in the opposite direction. The Minister spoke about the importance of increasing investment in plant and machinery; the reality is that the Bill cuts the writing-down allowances, unless they relate to new plant and machinery, which will weigh against that very objective. This is an unfair Bill. My right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest West (Sir Desmond Swayne) raised the issue of the farm tax, and he was absolutely right to do so. Farms up and down this country are now worried about the future. Farms in my constituency, which have sometimes been in the family for decades or generations—in some cases even for centuries—are now having to stare down the barrel of a very uncertain future. What an irony and what a tragedy that, during the run-up to the general election, the then shadow Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, the right hon. Member for Streatham and Croydon North (Steve Reed), looked the president of the National Farmers Union in the eye, and said that, when it came to inheritance tax, farmers had nothing to fear from a future Labour Government. How wrong they were. As Tom Bradshaw said, this whole tax increase is “morally wrong and economically flawed”, and he is right.

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39. 16 Dec 2025·Parliament·Sir Mel Stride

    Finance (No. 2) Bill

    I welcome the hon. Lady’s intervention. She is absolutely right on the matter of APR, but the issue is not just APR.

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40. 16 Dec 2025·Parliament·Sir Mel Stride

    Finance (No. 2) Bill

    The hon. Lady is absolutely right. The value of farming goes above and beyond successful businesses simply contributing to the economy in the traditional way. Farming also underpins our food security as a nation.

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