Finance Bill

Lord Bruce of Bennachie Excerpts

Tuesday 28th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hanson]

The hon. Gentleman shows his complete ignorance of the impact that value added tax has on ordinary working people and their families. The rise in VAT is costing ordinary working people in Redcar and every other constituency an additional £450 each this year. Low-paid people will bear the brunt of that. I look forward to going back to Redcar with hon. Friends from the north-east and explaining what the hon. Gentleman is doing about those concerns.

[Malcolm Bruce (Gordon) (LD)]

The Labour party is keen on cutting taxes and on opposing cuts in expenditure. Consequently, it would widen the deficit, which is already at record levels. The consequence of that would be an increase in interest rates. Does the right hon. Gentleman not think that the retail trade and consumers would be more concerned about an increase in interest rates than a rise in VAT?

[Mr Hanson]

At the beginning of my speech, I said that we had a deficit reduction plan at the last election. When I was a Minister at the Home Office in the previous Government, we forwarded plans for £1.5 billion-worth of expenditure cuts. The Conservative-led Government are cutting £2.5 billion in that Department, which is why we are losing police officers and police community support officers, and why I fear that crime will go up. There was a plan. There were certainly issues that we had to tackle, and we will tackle them. The way in which the Government propose to tackle the deficit goes too far, too fast and too deep. It is being done in an unfair way that hits the poorest people hardest, and it will damage the long-term business interests of the United Kingdom.