Conservative and Unionist Party MP for North East Cambridgeshire since (elected).
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| Party | Office | Area | Period | Began | Ended | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Conservative | MP | North East Cambridgeshire | – present | elected | — | Party history |
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The independent Office for Budget Responsibility’s “Economic and fiscal outlook”, published alongside the Budget, says on page 77 that the consequence of the 4% hike in property income tax will be fewer rental properties and higher rents as landlords pass on those costs. Does the Minister think the OBR is wrong? If not, does he accept that rents will go up as a result of those measures?
May I constructively suggest a way in which the Secretary of State could help three Cabinet colleagues—the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Secretary, who is building a major reservoir in my constituency; the Housing Secretary, who has big plans within Cambridgeshire; and the Chancellor, who often talks about the Oxford-Cambridge arc? Securing a light rail link to the reservoir will shape the public response to it, but the Department for Transport currently does not seem to be involved at all with the other Departments. I do not expect her to be familiar with the scheme—it is primarily for one of her colleagues—but could she write to me setting out what her Department might do to help those other Departments deliver on their aims?
Will the Leader of the House raise with the Home Secretary the very real concerns of residents in Fenland about the proposed asylum centre in Leverington? The area was excluded by the previous Conservative Government as unsuitable for such accommodation. The council, on the basis of legal advice, has raised a number of objections, and the Home Office has missed its own deadline to give a decision by 16 October. The site is not suitable for the proposed asylum centre, and I would be grateful if he could raise that point with the Home Secretary.
After more than two years, the Minister has come to the Chamber today to say that all options are still on the table. He cannot say what the timeline is for Cambridgeshire, yet he also said from the Dispatch Box that his priority is getting resources to the frontline. I am not surprised that the Secretary of State, who is in her place, has decided to duck making this statement and has passed it to the Minister, but will he answer the question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Weald of Kent (Katie Lam)? What has been the total cost to local authorities and the Government of this process so far, given that we have arrived at a situation today where all options are on the table?
As the Defence Secretary is talking about defence spending, could I just point him to paragraphs 2.5 and 2.6 on page 31 of the Red Book? I am sure that one of his Treasury colleagues will have a copy. He will see that £10.3 billion of that spending is funded by reprioritisation, alongside £4.7 billion, £3 billion of which is from capital cuts elsewhere and £1.7 billion from the reserve. He will, of course, get the £1.7 billion from the reserve, but has he been told by the Treasury where that £3 billion of capital savings is coming from? How much of it, if any, is coming from his Department? Can he assure the House that the Government are on track on the more than £10 billion of efficiencies, given that the Institute for Government and many others say that it is highly unlikely to be delivered?
The Defence Secretary opened today’s debate by praising the former Prime Minister and former Chancellor. That may come as a surprise to them both, given that earlier this year the Defence Secretary resigned from the Government, saying in his resignation letter that he could not serve alongside them because of the lack of direction and the drift. It is less than a year since Labour Members cheered and waved their Order Papers at the Budget from the right hon. Member for Leeds West and Pudsey (Rachel Reeves), and it is striking how much continuity there is today with measures that they cheered yesterday, despite being so unhappy with the previous Chancellor. To illustrate that, I will highlight certain phrases and words we hear from Labour Members on a regular basis, starting with perhaps the most frequent, which is the need to have no austerity. An “end to austerity” is a constant refrain—<em>[</em><em>Interruption.</em><em>]</em> I see those on the Front Bench nodding. They might be surprised to see that the OBR report states on pages 21 and 115 that there is an £11 billion shortfall from the year after next for all Departments, other than protected Departments such as Health. The Government have already said that they want to commit to Defence. I do not think the party that stands saying “24 hours to save the NHS” will cut funding to the health service going into an election, but perhaps that is its policy. If not, according to the OBR, Labour will be cutting funding for unprotected Departments by 2.6% in those final three years. There is a paradox about that: only last week, the Defence Secretary came to the House to say that there is urgency in national resilience, yet Departments like the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, which would deliver that national resilience, will be the same unprotected ones facing cuts, so Labour Members are cheering a Budget in which there is austerity baked in—<em>[</em><em>Interruption.</em><em>]</em> They shake their heads. Labour Members may have been told by the Labour Whips, “Do not worry—the spending review will fix that”, but having run a spending review, I know that a spending review allocates the funds but does not decide on the quantum. They may have been told, “Do not worry, there will be a election”—maybe there will—but yesterday the Prime Minister was saying the opposite. Either they <span id="513" class="column-number" data-column-number="513"></span>believe a Budget that has austerity baked in, they think the spending review will fix it, or they do not believe the Prime Minister and think an election will avoid the issue entirely. But it is an odd position for Members who come to the Chamber talking about an end to austerity to then be cheering a Budget where that austerity is in the Red Book numbers. The second paradox is that Labour Members talk about breathing space. There are policy areas that show continuity with last year’s Budget: the 2p on property income tax is a repeat of last year’s 2p increase—4p in all—with both measures starting at the same time, in April next year. The OBR makes it clear that that will lead to fewer people entering the rental market, fewer landlords and prices going up. The Budget includes a bank tax, again repeating a trick of the former Chancellor, who thought, “If I tax employers with national insurance, it will not go through into a jobs’ tax”, so we have a bank tax on the basis that that will be more palatable. But do not take my word for it: <em>The Times</em> leader on 16 October said it will be a tax on growth, and one of Labour’s favourite advisers, Lord O’Neill, said it will “hobble” growth.
Of course it will be bearable for the chief executive because he will not take it from his bonus—he will take it by adding it to the mortgage rates and the loan rates that he charges the hon. Member’s constituents. Does the hon. Member honestly believe that the bankers will take that tax from their own bonuses, or does he think they will pass it on to constituents and consumers? That is exactly what <em>The Times</em>, Lord O'Neill and many others have commented: it is a displaced cost that adds to the constraints on businesses. This Government talk about wanting growth in every postcode, but making it harder for businesses to access capital will make it harder for them to expand. As with the measures imposed on landlords, this approach continues that taken by the previous Government. There is a lack of consistency in the proposals, even measured against those announced in the Labour conference last month. As the Minister pointed out, at the conference the Chancellor talked about how he was aghast at the idea of debt. Well, the OBR document makes it clear that the Budget measures are adding £8 billion of debt this year alone, on top of the £11 billion of additional debt that flows from interest rates and inflation. <em>[</em><em>Interruption.</em><em>]</em> Again, a Government who say that they want to reduce debt have a Budget that is adding to debt in a way that will further constrain the growth in every postcode. Unfortunately I have run out of time, but I suspect that in a few months’ time, as with the last Budget that Labour Members cheered, once the detail becomes more known and they see how it goes against many of the equities that they say that they stand for, we will find this Budget disowned in exactly the same way as the last one.<span id="514" class="column-number" data-column-number="514"></span>
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. The Economic Secretary has just said at the Dispatch Box that the welfare bill will come down. The BBC has been reporting, following the Chancellor saying the same thing this morning, that No. 10 and the Treasury have informed the media that that is not the case, and the welfare bill will not be coming down. How do we ensure that the House gets the true position, because it is rather hard to keep up when the message keeps changing?
The Minister said in reply to the shadow Secretary of State that the delay in the decision on Jackdaw was fiscally neutral because, in essence, the investment was made at risk.
The Minister shakes his head, but he said that there was no cost from the delay. Does he accept that the delay in a decision on Rosebank comes at a cost, both in terms of investment and in terms of taxpayer revenue? If so, will he set out what that cost is, in revenue, ahead of the Budget?