Spending Review and Autumn Statement

Craig Mackinlay Excerpts

Wednesday 25th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

There is additional support for disabled people who want to get into work. There is help for people who have been unemployed for 18 months through our help to work scheme. The additional conditionality that the hon. Gentleman refers to relates to people who are currently on housing benefit but do not face that conditionality. Housing benefit is becoming part of universal credit, so that is one category of people we can extend the conditionality to.

[Craig Mackinlay (South Thanet) (Con)]

May I follow my hon. Friend the Member for Faversham and Mid Kent (Helen Whately) in offering words of thanks from the people of Kent for the £250-million commitment to find a permanent solution to Operation Stack? Kent MPs should go and see the Chancellor more regularly. Does he agree that Kent, which is on the frontline of cross-border trade and movement of people, deserves special treatment and, at times, spending?

[Mr Osborne]

Kent is a very special place as the garden of England. My hon. Friend and other hon. Friends from Kent came to see me and made a compelling argument about what happens to local roads when the channel tunnel is blocked and how that affects his constituents and people in Folkestone near the tunnel mouth. We are making a quarter of a billion pound commitment to finding a permanent solution to that problem. I congratulate him and other Kent MPs on a successful campaign.