Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation

Clive Efford Excerpts

Tuesday 9th March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

I wish the Chancellor had sat down and asked himself when he was writing his Budget what he needed to do to reduce the social and economic divide in the UK and how he would stop those who have done well during the epidemic doing even better in the recovery, while millions more are on a downward slope—the K-shaped recovery that we all want to avoid. The K-shaped recovery will not be avoided by a Budget that increases poverty.

The Joseph Rowntree Foundation predicts that the cut in universal credit and tax credit will plunge a further 500,000 people into poverty, including 200,000 children. What we needed was a revision of the welfare state that will fit the needs of the gig economy and lift people out of poverty, not trap them in it.

During the recovery from the global banking crash, the Tories imposed 10 years of austerity on this country, cutting public services to the point where we struggled to respond to the covid crisis. The 120,000 deaths have not happened just by bad luck. The Tories changed, but their actions prove that their words are not what they intend to do. They claim to have found a Keynesian mojo, but if there is anything that exposes their façade and the same old Tory thinking, we need look no further than a derisory 1% pay increase offered to NHS staff.

A Government who were committed to renewing our NHS after the covid crisis would have made sure that we permanently filled the 100,000 vacancies that existed at its start. They would have made sure that we were recruiting the highest quality recruits into jobs in the NHS and retaining its highly qualified, dedicated staff. A 1% pay offer does none of those things. Instead, what we got from the Government were choreographed pledges for money to go to Tory seats and some rehashed policies on housing that will repeat the errors of austerity, fuelling another housing bubble, forcing first-time buyers out of the market.

The level of home ownership has gone down under the Tories at a time when borrowing is at an all-time consistent low. There are now 800,000 fewer people under the age of 45 who own their homes than in 2010. What we needed was a plan to decarbonise the existing housing stock. That would create jobs in every region. What we needed was a plan to build council housing and to upskill local workforces. Sadly, that requires thinking of which the Tories are simply not capable.