Finance (No. 2) Bill

Debate between Mel Stride and Sorcha Eastwood

2nd reading
Tuesday 16th December 2025 Commons Chamber

[Sir Mel Stride]

I welcome the hon. Lady’s intervention. She is absolutely right on the matter of APR, but the issue is not just APR.

[Sorcha Eastwood (Lagan Valley) (Alliance)]

We are in a world that is extremely uncertain, and our farmers are part of our national security, but we are farming them to death. What does that do for sustainability and our thriving farm agribusinesses?

[Sir Mel Stride]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right. The value of farming goes above and beyond successful businesses simply contributing to the economy in the traditional way. Farming also underpins our food security as a nation.

Conduct of the Chancellor of the Exchequer

Debate between Mel Stride and Sorcha Eastwood

Wednesday 10th December 2025 Commons Chamber

[Sir Mel Stride]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The Government talk a good game on poverty, but when it comes down to what they do, we see something entirely different.

[Sorcha Eastwood (Lagan Valley) (Alliance)]

On the point about what poverty means to our constituents, we are sitting in Northern Ireland with the local growth fund and the Treasury refuses to understand that the way we do things is different. We do not need 70% capital funding; we need it the other way around. That, to me, speaks to some of the substantive motion that I am comfortable to speak to, which is that it sometimes feels that the message is not getting through. Whether it is on the farm tax or the winter fuel allowance, our constituents need a Government who will listen. They promised to listen, but so far that has not been reflected.

[Sir Mel Stride]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right.

There is another change to the inheritance tax regime that will be equally as destructive as the agricultural property relief changes, and that is the business property relief changes—the tax changes relating to family firms up and down the country. I have met many of them. These are sometimes substantial businesses that have gone from having a bright outlook under the last Government to suddenly being concerned about the provisions they will now have to make to avoid being broken up as a consequence of the ruinous changes to the inheritance tax regime for those businesses. This is destroying investment, jobs and growth. That is the story of the Labour party.