Financial Statement and Budget Report
Just increase tax.
Showing every spoken contribution, including 5,750 under 12 words. Hide short remarks
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Point of Order
That is not a matter for the Chair. The Chancellor is about to make her Budget statement, and I expect that Members and their constituents wish to hear from the Chancellor directly. However, before I call the Chancellor to speak, I will make a short statement.
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Financial Statement and Budget Report
Before I call the Chancellor, I will make a short statement. For a number of weeks, and yet again yesterday, there have been extensive briefings to the media on the Government’s fiscal policy and public finances. This disappointing trend in relation to Budget briefings has been growing for a number of years under successive Governments, but it appears to have reached an unprecedented high. Weeks ago, we saw the Chancellor delivering a speech in Downing Street setting the scene for the Budget, and specific policy announcements have been briefed out to the media in advance of today’s financial statement. [Interruption.] I do not need any help from Members. It seems that just a moment ago, the Office for Budget Responsibility’s analysis appeared online. This all falls short of the standards that the House expects. The premature disclosure of the contents of the Budget has always been regarded as a supreme discourtesy to this House and to all the democratically elected Members, not to mention to Mr Speaker, and to me, the Chairman of Ways and Means. The Government’s own “Ministerial Code” cannot be clearer. Paragraph 9.1 states: “When Parliament is in session, the most important announcements of Government policy should be made in the first instance in Parliament.” I have always upheld the right of this House and its Members to be treated with respect, and to be the first to hear major Government policy announcements on behalf of their constituents. As Chairman of Ways and Means, I have responsibility for overseeing the House’s consideration of the Budget statement and the ensuing resolutions; that is described in paragraph 36.33 of “Erskine May” as “the most important business of Ways and Means.” I want hon. Members on both sides of the House to have adequate opportunity to hold the Chancellor to account, rather than their hearing and reading about new policies daily in the media. Like many, I expected better. Before I call the Chancellor of the Exchequer, I remind hon. Members that copies of the Budget resolutions will be available to them in the Vote Office in Members’ Lobby at the end of the statement, and online. I also remind hon. Members that interventions are not taken during the Chancellor’s statement, nor during replies from the Leader of the Opposition or the Leader of the Liberal Democrats. I call the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
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Financial Statement and Budget Report
Order. There is far too much noise. I expected so much better from you, Dr Luke Evans; you are meant to be a leader in your community. Simmer down.
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Financial Statement and Budget Report
Order. It is very hard to hear the Chancellor over all the shouting. Mr Holmes, you promised me yesterday that you would be on your top behaviour in the first few minutes. I call the Chancellor.
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Financial Statement and Budget Report
Order. There is far too much noise, far too much excitement. People need to calm down a little.
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Financial Statement and Budget Report
Order. It is so noisy in here we can barely hear the Chancellor. Everybody needs to calm down.
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Financial Statement and Budget Report
Order. We do not need commentary from the Back Benches. Mr Dewhirst, you are so loud; it is remarkable how far your voice carries.
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Financial Statement and Budget Report
Order. The noise is far too high.
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Financial Statement and Budget Report
Order. Our constituents want to hear the Chancellor.
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Financial Statement and Budget Report
Order. Mr Rankin and Ms Morton, your voices carry right across the Chamber—try to take a breath every so often.
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Financial Statement and Budget Report
We now come to the motion entitled “Income Tax (Charge)”. It is on this motion that the debate will take place today and on the succeeding days. The questions on this motion and on the remaining motions will be put at the end of the Budget debate on Tuesday 2 December. I call the Chancellor of the Exchequer to move the motion formally.
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Budget Resolutions
I call the Leader of the Opposition.
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Budget Resolutions
Order. Can colleagues who are exiting the Chamber do so swiftly and quietly, so that we can focus on the Leader of the Opposition?
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Budget Resolutions
Order. The Chief Whip in particular knows that we do not allow clapping in the Chamber.
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Budget Resolutions
Order. Colleagues need most definitely to simmer down: just breathe a little and allow the Leader of the Opposition to be heard.
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Budget Resolutions
Order. Conservative colleagues are drowning out the Leader of the Opposition’s speech, so just be mindful that nobody at home will be able to hear her.
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Budget Resolutions
Order. If you are on the Front Bench, I can obviously see you, Mr Kyle. There is no need for you to be chuntering this loudly. Everyone else can see and hear you as well.
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Budget Resolutions
Order. Mr Vince! And Mr Thompson, you are so enthusiastic that I was worried a moment ago that you would knock Mr Waugh off his seat. We need to calm down and breathe, and we need to ensure that we can hear the Leader of the Opposition.
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Budget Resolutions
Order. Members who are leaving the Chamber should do so quietly and quickly before we come to our first Back-Bench contribution. Other Members who are trying to catch my eye should resume their seat; I have noticed them bobbing. I call the Chair of the Treasury Committee.
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Budget Resolutions
I call the leader of the Liberal Democrats.
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Budget Resolutions
Order. You are a senior Member of the House, and I made it very clear earlier that no interventions should be made on party leaders.
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Budget Resolutions
Order. Colleagues are now permitted to make interventions, which a Back Bencher may accept or decline them.
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Budget Resolutions
Order. How on earth can “you” do that? We cannot start off these four days of Budget debate with the words “you” and “your”. Come to your conclusion quickly and using the right language.
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Budget Resolutions
Order. I will remind colleagues that interventions must be short and to the point, and must be an actual question, not a statement.
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Budget Resolutions
I call the Father of the House.
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Budget Resolutions
Order. The hon. Member used the term “you”. Perhaps focusing, and looking at the Chair, will stop colleagues from doing so.
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Budget Resolutions
Just shy of 60 Members wish to contribute, so there is a speaking limit of 10 minutes to begin with.
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Budget Resolutions
Order. The speaking limit is now eight minutes.
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Engagements
May I first pay tribute to the many farmers who have come to Westminster today to protest about the shameful attack on them in last year’s Budget? I want them to know that the Conservatives stand with them. [Interruption.] This has been the most chaotic lead-up to a Budget in living memory, with resignations, hostile briefings—[Interruption.]
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Engagements
Nobody wants this Budget, Mr Speaker! We have had resignations, hostile briefings and leaks galore. Even in the past 10 minutes, there has been an unprecedented leak of the OBR analysis. These leaks have been so serious that even the former chief economist of the Bank of England has said that Labour’s “fiscal fandango” is “the single biggest reason growth has flatlined”. Does the Prime Minister agree with Andy Haldane, and does he have an explanation for this complete shambles?
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Engagements
We are talking about the leaks. The Prime Minister does not seem to appreciate the impact of these Budget leaks on the UK economy. Even the Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister has said this morning that the leaks were unacceptable, so will the Prime Minister launch an investigation into the Budget leaks and punish those responsible?
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Engagements
The Prime Minister talks about the decisions that the Chancellor has already taken. If they were that great, we would not have all the farmers protesting outside. The Prime Minister does not want to talk about leaks, but we can see that the chaos in No. 10 is having real-world consequences. Instead of focusing on the economy, they have been fighting like rats. Several journalists reported that No. 10 sources had briefed against the Health Secretary and other senior Cabinet Ministers; the Prime Minister then told us that these briefings did not come from No. 10. Will he repeat, on the Floor of the House, the claim that none of his advisers has briefed against members of the Cabinet?
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Engagements
The Prime Minister expects us to believe him, but no one does. We all know that he did not have a serious leak inquiry. What he did was ask Morgan McSweeney to investigate Morgan McSweeney, and then Morgan McSweeney discovered that Morgan McSweeney was innocent. All this calls into question the Prime Minister’s judgment. We read this weekend that he wants the former Deputy Prime Minister back in his Cabinet; he must have forgotten that she had to resign only a few months ago for tax evasion. When did the Prime Minister decide that lawbreakers can be lawmakers?
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Engagements
It is not tittle-tattle. We all know that the Prime Minister is only talking about welcoming the Deputy Prime Minister back because he is desperate to shore up his crumbling leadership, but if he does welcome her back, will he set a condition that she must pay back the £40,000 of property taxes she avoided—the same property taxes that the Government are very happy to put on everyone else—and return her £17,000 of severance pay?
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Engagements
That sounds like a no. I have never heard the Prime Minister speak so highly of people avoiding their taxes. In summary, this just looks like a Government who are a slow-motion car crash. The Prime Minister’s Cabinet Ministers are briefing against each other, his MPs are planning for life after him, and the most chaotic run-up to a Budget in recent memory is happening on his watch. Even the Chief Whip is telling MPs that he wants out. The truth is simple: his MPs do not trust him, the markets do not trust him, and the public certainly do not trust him. When will he finally accept that the chaos starts and ends with him?
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Budget Resolutions
May I congratulate the right hon. Lady on delivering her second Budget? I hope she enjoyed it, because it really should be her last. What a total humiliation—[Interruption.]
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Budget Resolutions
It is a total humiliation. Last year, the Chancellor put up taxes by £40 billion—the biggest tax raid in British history. She promised that she would not be back for more. She swore that it was a one-off. She told everyone that from now on, there would be stability and she would pay for everything with growth. Today, she has broken every single one of those promises. If she had any decency, she would resign. At the last Budget, she said she was proud to be the country’s first-ever female Chancellor; after this Budget, she will go down as the country’s worst-ever Chancellor. Today—[Interruption.]
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Budget Resolutions
Today the Chancellor has announced a new tax raid of £26 billion, and Labour Members were all cheering. Household income is down. Spending policies in this Budget increase borrowing in every year. That smorgasbord of misery we just heard from her can be summed up in one sentence: Labour is hiking taxes to pay for welfare. This is a Budget for “Benefits Street”, paid for by working people. This Budget increases benefits for 560,000 families by an average of £5,000. The Government are hiking taxes on workers, pensioners and savers to pay for handouts to keep their Back Benchers quiet. These are the same—[Interruption.] They can chunter all they like. These are the same Back Benchers who cheered last year when the Chancellor taxed jobs and left more than 100,000 people without an income. They cheered because they did not understand the consequences of what they were doing, and they still do not. It has not been an easy time for the Chancellor. No one liked seeing her sitting on the Government Benches as it dawned on her that her own Back Benchers were going to do to her political career what she has done to our economy. She could have chosen today to bring down welfare spending and get more people into work. Instead, she has chosen to put up tax after tax after tax—taxes on workers, taxes on savers, taxes on pensioners, taxes on investors and taxes on homes, holidays, cars and even milkshakes. There are taxes on anyone doing the right thing. She and this Government have lost what little credibility they had left, and no one will ever trust her again. What is amazing is that the Chancellor has the nerve to come to this House and claim that this is all someone else’s fault. She has a laundry list of excuses. Labour Members blame the Conservatives as if we have been sneaking into the Treasury under the cover of darkness to give pay rises to the unions. The Chancellor inherited an economy with inflation at 2% and record-high employment. She has tanked it in just over a year. She has endless excuses—she blames Brexit and Donald Trump, but she needs to blame herself. I have some news for the Chancellor—she did not seem to understand what the OBR was saying. Inflation is up, not down, and that inflation was stoked by her tax and spend decisions. The economic and fiscal outlook says that the OBR expects inflation to stay higher for longer. Everybody else has read the OBR analysis, but she still has not. She blames higher than expected borrowing costs. Where does she think they came from? [Hon. Members: “You!”] Those borrowing costs are driven by the Chancellor’s lack of grip. Labour Members are saying those costs came from us, but she is paying more to borrow than Greece. She is paying more to borrow than at any point under the 14 years of Conservative government—perhaps if Labour MPs read a book sometimes, they would know something—which included an energy crisis sparked by a war in Ukraine and a global pandemic. What is the Chancellor’s excuse? She is taking the public for fools, but they are under no illusions about whose fault this is. The fact is that the bad choices the Chancellor is making today—choices to break promises, choices to put up taxes, choices to spend more of other people’s money—are because of the bad choices she made at the last disastrous Budget. If you want growth, you need to start with knowing what kind of country you want to be and make a plan to get there. You need to create certainty for the people and businesses who will drive growth. There is no growth and no plan, because Labour focused on settling scores and scratching the itches it had while in opposition. The Chancellor promised stability. She delivered chaos. Just look at the circus around this Budget: first, the leaks—then more leaks to try to undo the damage; calling panicky press conferences and U-turning on her U-turns; rolling the pitch one day only to plough through it the next. She had the cheek to talk about stability, but she has become the first Chancellor in history to release the whole Budget ahead of time. This is extraordinary, and it tells us everything we need to know about her grip on the Treasury. She is making the UK a shambolic laughing stock to international investors, and if she does not resign for breaking her promises, she should sure as hell go for this. What have we got for all this chaos and disorder? There are 1 million more people claiming universal credit than there were at the time of the last Budget. Government spending? Up. Welfare spending? Up. Universal credit claimants? Up. Unemployment? Up. Debt interest? Up. Inflation? Up. And what about the things that we want to go up? Growth? Down. Investment? Down. Business confidence? Down. The credibility of the Chancellor? [Hon. Members: “Down!”] Not just down, but through the floor. These figures are shocking. Does the Chancellor really think that anyone will be confused by the sleight of hand in her speech? Her speech today was an exercise in self-delusion. Today she had an opportunity to apologise and show some humility; instead, we have been fed puff pieces in The Times and the FT showing a woman wallowing in self-pity and whining about mansplaining and misogyny. Let me explain to the Chancellor—[Interruption.]
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Budget Resolutions
All we have had is wallowing in self-pity and whining about misogyny and mansplaining, so let me explain to the Chancellor, woman to woman, that people out there are not complaining because she is female; they are complaining because she is utterly incompetent. Real equality means being held to the same standard as everyone else. It means being judged on results. Take the Chancellor’s bright idea: the Office for Value for Money. It has been closed down because it did not save a penny. In fact, it cost the taxpayer £1.6 million. You could not make this stuff up. I have identified a way to save taxpayers huge amounts of money, by sacking just one person: the woman sitting opposite me. The ex-chief economist of the Bank of England was not mansplaining when he said that the uncertainty around today’s Budget is “the single biggest reason growth has flatlined”. What did the Chancellor think would happen when she went on breakfast telly to do an emergency public service announcement: “I interrupt your Cheerios to bring you this frightening message about income tax”? Then, unbelievably, she changed her mind three days later. No wonder people are in despair. She says she wants people to respect her—[Interruption.]