Autumn Statement
Debate between Fiona O'Donnell and George Osborne(9 years, 5 months ago)
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Mr Osborne
Like my right hon. Friend, I too have the challenge of HS2 going through my constituency, although of course she is further along in the process because her constituency is affected by the first phase of the route. I know, from my experience and from talking to her, that this has a big impact on communities. We have tried to make the compensation generous and to make the process for accessing it easier. It is certainly a lot easier than when I, as a constituency MP, had to deal with the compensation relating to the second runway at Manchester airport. Of course, I will look at any ideas that she puts forward, but any measure has to be affordable. I should also point out that in today’s document we set out further reforms that we intend to make to the compulsory purchase regime.
Fiona O’Donnell (East Lothian) (Lab)
The Chancellor talked tough on tax evasion today, but so far none of the Crown dependencies or overseas territories has committed to a public register of beneficial ownership. I know that my right hon. Friend the shadow Chancellor will act tough on this issue. Why will not this Chancellor and his Government make some progress on it?
Mr Osborne
Frankly, the hon. Lady is not being fair to the Government or to those territories and dependencies. There had been no progress at all when we came into office. They have all now committed to the automatic exchange of information; they all attended the conference in Berlin where they made the international commitment to do that; and they are all consulting, right now, on the creation of these registries. They are doing that because my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister put this issue centre stage on the G8 agenda in Lough Erne.
Jobs and Growth
Debate between Fiona O'Donnell and George Osborne(12 years ago)
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Mr Osborne
As I was explaining, four fifths of those who work part-time are getting the part-time work they want. The right hon. Gentleman should celebrate the fact that 400,000 more people are employed than was the case two years ago. Why not get up and welcome that?
If the Opposition’s argument is that we need to do even more, I agree. In the past six weeks alone, we have opened 24 enterprise zones around the country, cut businesses tax to one of the lowest rates in the world, increased support for small business research and development, reformed employment law in the teeth of Labour opposition to double the period before unfair dismissal claims can be made, reinvigorated the right to buy, launched NewBuy mortgage schemes, awarded ultra-fast broadband grants to 10 of our largest cities, frozen council tax across England, launched a £20 billion national loan guarantee scheme that is already delivering cheaper loans to hundreds and thousands of businesses, and increased the personal allowance to cut tax for 20 million working people and lift 1 million of the lowest paid out of tax altogether, with another 1 million to come. That is just in the past six weeks.
Yes, the Government must work harder and do more. The world does not owe this country a living. We will do that, but we have done a great deal already.
Fiona O’Donnell
What does the Chancellor say—apart from “Work harder”—to SMEs in my constituency that tell me that the single greatest contribution his Government could make to economic growth and the creation of jobs is to cut VAT?
Mr Osborne
This is what we have done for small businesses: we have cut the small companies tax rate, which was going to go up under the plans that we inherited and which the Labour party voted for in the previous Parliament; we have got rid of Labour’s jobs tax; and we have frozen the business rates. We will check the record carefully, of course, but I think that in his speech the shadow Chancellor was advocating an increase in national insurance.
IMF
Debate between Fiona O'Donnell and George Osborne(12 years ago)
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Mr Osborne
IMF loans are made with conditions, and one condition is interest, although there is a specific programme to help very low-income countries to cope with the interest costs. It is very important, as part of any IMF analysis, that we undertake proper debt analysis, and the IMF has been pretty instrumental in driving through the private sector creditor write-offs that have happened in Greece in order to improve debt sustainability, something which—I do not think it is any secret—many eurozone countries were not particularly in favour of. The IMF can therefore take action to improve debt sustainability.
Fiona O’Donnell (East Lothian) (Lab)
The Chancellor has told the House that this is not about a eurozone bail-out, but back in September he also told us that we would not contribute again to the IMF bailing out the eurozone. If that is the case, why are eurozone countries contributing proportionately more?
Mr Osborne
I said very clearly in my statement that the principal reason the world economy is unstable is the problems in the eurozone, and, as all the questions have demonstrated, there is of course a connection between those problems and the need to have a well resourced IMF, but, as I said last autumn, we are not prepared to see IMF resource going into eurozone bail-out funds. It needs to be for individual countries and for individual country programmes, and that is a view which not just I or Britain happens to have, but which Japan, South Korea, Australia and European countries that are not in the European Union, such as Norway and Switzerland, share. Ask yourself the question, Mr Speaker, and the House can ask itself, too: why have all those other countries thought it is in their interests to help to deal with a problem that is actually on Britain’s doorstep as well?
The Economy
Debate between Fiona O'Donnell and George Osborne(12 years, 11 months ago)
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Mr Osborne
We have extended the mortgage interest relief scheme—I inherited a plan for it, too, to end—and of course are trying to avoid repossessions, but there was a large number of repossessions under the Labour Government, and that is because—[Interruption.] I certainly inherited a huge economic mess from the Labour party. The truth is that one of the problems we are having to deal is the enormous housing boom, which was bigger than that experienced in any other major western economy, including the United States of America. We are putting in place those structural reforms, cutting corporation tax, creating more apprenticeships than the country has ever seen, lifting the low paid out of tax, reforming our planning system, reducing the burden of regulation, accelerating education reform, introducing the green investment bank and passing the landmark welfare legislation.