Oral Answers to Questions

Chuka Umunna Excerpts

Thursday 6th September 2012 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Universities and Science (Mr David Willetts)]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right about the strength of the cyber-cluster in Malvern. Yesterday evening we held a major conference at the Foreign Office, at which I and colleagues briefed representatives of FTSE 100 companies on the threat to cyber-security, the practical steps that they could take to ensure it and the strength of the British cyber-security industry.

[Mr Chuka Umunna (Streatham) (Lab)]

May I first welcome the Secretary of State’s new team of minders to their positions on the Front Bench? I note that he is so irrepressible that he needs not one but three minders to keep him in check. His new minder of state, the hon. Member for Sevenoaks (Michael Fallon), told the Financial Times yesterday that he would

“make sure business feels it has a senior champion in the department.”

Does the Secretary of State not feel that he himself has been a sufficient champion of business across Government of late?

[Vince Cable]

I certainly regard myself as a champion of business, and the success that we have had in private sector job creation and in some of our main strategic industries, such as the car and aerospace industries, with both of which I have worked closely, is evidence of that. I very much look forward to working with my colleague, and we have exactly the same aspirations for British business.

[Mr Umunna]

The fact is that business simply does not believe that the Government are doing enough. Last month, the head of the British Chambers of Commerce said that he would give key politicians—presumably the Secretary of State is one of them—three out of 10 for delivery. A couple of weeks before, members of the Institute of Directors went further, stating that Government policies to support business were ineffective in every single area, and who can blame them? The Government have failed to deliver on their infrastructure plan, they have failed to get finance to businesses that need it, and they have failed to meet the delivery targets in their 2011 plan for growth. The Government are ridden with indecision. Three marks out of 10 was generous. How many marks would the Business Secretary give the Government given their litany of failure?

[Vince Cable]

Whenever I talk to business groups—which I do frequently—they unreservedly support the Government’s emphasis on financial stability That is something that the Labour party takes lightly, although we have emphasised it. There is a major agenda to revive the British economy, but in his question the hon. Gentleman made no reference to this morning’s housing statement. At the moment, construction is the most difficult sector in the British economy, because of the collapse that took place in the wake of the boom that his party created when in office. This morning, the Government have proposed a series of businesslike initiatives to free up sites for private development, to put substantial guarantees and resources behind social housing, and to revive a sector that was destroyed in the false bubble created by the hon. Gentleman’s Government.