Taxes

Debate between Alison Griffiths and Jeevun Sandher

Tuesday 15th July 2025 Commons Chamber

[Dr Sandher]

We saw it in the insulation build-out; David Cameron, as he put it, cut the green crap. Insulation rates were rising when we left office, but they were cut throughout the 2010s; as a nation, we have not had that insulation. That is why we brought in the warm homes plan and are funding it with £13 billion. Millions more homes will be insulated under this Government, bringing down energy bills by hundreds of pounds. Those plans for insulation are funded by the tax rises that the Conservatives oppose. Time and again, we ask them what they would like less investment in, and time and again, no answer is given.

We on the Government Benches are trying to build a country according to our values—a country where each of us is doing well, is doing better, is better educated, is healthier and finds it easier to get around. Those are the building blocks of our nation’s wealth. To build that wealth takes investment, which must be funded, and those who benefit most from our nation’s productivity should be asked to contribute more. That is exactly what this Government are ensuring.

[Alison Griffiths]

Does the hon. Gentleman recognise that if people are to contribute, the fundamental bedrock is having a job, and that the jobs tax is causing mass unemployment and business closures?

[Dr Sandher]

Employment is rising, and has risen since the general election. [Interruption.] The reason why unemployment is rising is that more people are seeking to enter the labour force; people are less inactive than before, because we are getting waiting lists down. I would rather people were looking for a job than stayed out of the labour force entirely, as the Opposition would have it. We want to build the kind of country where people are able to work.

We increased employers’ national insurance contributions in the Budget while protecting the smallest businesses. We ended the non-dom tax break, to make sure that the ultra-rich could not escape taxes by using a loophole, and increased taxes on private jets. We are getting more of the energy giants’ unearned profits into the public purse to invest in the things that we all need.

We know the Conservatives will complain constantly about the things we are raising money for, but they will never say what they would cut. We saw what happened over the past 14 years; we saw the weaker nation they left in their wake. The Government are investing to change that for good. After the past 14 years, we were left a weaker and more divided nation—a nation in which each of us produces less, and looks inward as we have found it harder to pay the bills. That is exactly what the Government are fixing, and what we are investing in.

I am proud of this Government. I am proud of this country. Most of all, I am proud of the country we will build, in which each of us does well, and we recognise that our common strength is found in our common prosperity.