Oral Answers to Questions

Karen Lumley Excerpts

Tuesday 12th October 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gauke]

My hon. Friend is right. There is a need to balance the desire for a quick service with ensuring that we do not allow fraudulent registrations. Between April and September this year, 57.4% of applications were processed within the target 10 calendar days. There was an improvement in the rate during August and September, when 71.4% and 79.7% of applications were processed within the 10 days.

[Karen Lumley (Redditch) (Con)]

14. What assessment he has made of the effect on GDP of proposals to increase the level of economic growth in the June 2010 Budget.

[The Economic Secretary to the Treasury (Justine Greening)]

A key part of the emergency Budget was to make sure that we rebalanced our economy on to a more sustainable, private-led footing with economic growth taking place. As I said, we introduced a range of measures to support business, but we did not stop at that; we now have a second Finance Bill that brings forward further measures. The Office for Budget Responsibility’s analysis following the emergency Budget showed that it is forecasting a sustained recovery in economic output, with employment growing year on year and unemployment falling year on year.

[Karen Lumley]

What would have happened in smaller, mixed-economy areas such as my constituency of Redditch if the Government had refused to take the challenge as they have and face up to the difficult decisions?

[Justine Greening]

Such areas would have faced a jobs tax with higher national insurance, higher corporation tax rates, lower economic confidence and, quite possibly, higher interest rates.