Ian C. Lucas
Main Page: Ian C. Lucas (Labour - Wrexham)Department Debates - View all Ian C. Lucas's debates with the HM Treasury
(9 years, 2 months ago)
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Albert Owen (Ynys Môn) (Lab)
It is a great pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Ceredigion (Mr Williams), who is a fellow Welshman. We are having this debate in Welsh tourist week, and we have had a very good week promoting the pleasures that people can experience when they come to Wales.
I pay tribute to the Cut Tourism VAT campaign group for its excellent campaign. If the Chancellor is minded to make an announcement tomorrow and follow suit with what we are asking for in this debate, it would be a lot to do with the long-term work of the Cut Tourism VAT campaign, and indeed, the cross-party support that it has received.
I am very much an opponent of VAT. I believe that, as a consumer tax, it is regressive and hits the poorest in our society, an argument that I shall develop later. I agreed with the Prime Minister when he said, as Leader of the Opposition only a few weeks before the last general election, that VAT was a regressive tax and that it has had negative implications for the economy. I have been consistent in my view and I believe that the rise in VAT in 2010 sucked oxygen out of the economy at a very difficult time and held sectors back, including tourism.
Ian Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab)
Does my hon. Friend agree that the temporary reduction in VAT that the Labour Government introduced in the previous Parliament was successful in creating the growth that this Chancellor inherited from that Labour Government?
Albert Owen
Yes, indeed; it was a brave step. [Interruption.] It is interesting that we are getting heckled from across the Chamber by people who voted to put VAT up previously, but are campaigning here today to cut it. We are not going to take any lessons from some Members here in the Chamber today. I believe, as does the hon. Member for Ceredigion, whom I congratulate on securing this debate, that cutting VAT would give a great example to the industry.
In the past few months, I have spent time in France and the Republic of Ireland, where I have seen our near neighbours benefit from a cut in value added tax.