Budget Resolutions

Richard Holden Excerpts

Monday 1st December 2025 Commons Chamber

[Mr Richard Holden (Basildon and Billericay) (Con)]

The real issue here is hiding in plain sight. It is on the annunciator. This is all about bearing down on inflation, because this Government have already catastrophically failed to keep it at 2%, where the Conservative party left it at the time of the general election. That is having an impact on the cost of living up and down the country. From every single business I visit, and every single person I meet on the street in Basildon and Billericay, I hear, “Since Labour got in, things have got worse.”

Unemployment is up, as is inflation—it is now double what it was at the general election. It is the highest inflation in the G7, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Stone, Great Wyrley and Penkridge (Sir Gavin Williamson) said. Rents are up, as my right hon. Friend the Member for East Surrey (Claire Coutinho) said. Part-time jobs are being hammered, and as my right hon. Friends the Members for North East Cambridgeshire (Steve Barclay), and for Aldridge-Brownhills (Wendy Morton), have mentioned, taxes on employment are really hurting people. Growth is down, particularly in the North sea, as my hon. Friend the Member for Gordon and Buchan (Harriet Cross) said in her fantastic speech.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Weald of Kent (Katie Lam) said, energy prices are through the roof. That is hitting our ability to deliver growth for businesses, particularly our manufacturing sector. Right across the piece, this Government are hammering businesses; as my right hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury (John Glen) said, business rates for high-street firms are up by at least 40% since the general election, despite what we are constantly told by Ministers. Despite the election pledges, tax rises are hitting working people up and down the country. Under this Government, taxes are up by £66 billion a year, and alongside that, debt has risen by tens of billions of pounds.

The real issue for the cost of living is Labour’s doom loop—higher taxes, higher prices, lower growth and more unemployment, followed by higher taxes, higher prices, lower growth and more unemployment—but this Government simply do not get it. They have apparently tried educating their Back Benchers, but their Back Benchers have made their position clear. Regarding welfare, one was quoted as saying,

“I don’t understand why this means tax rises when it’s only a few billion pounds”.

Imagine how that is going down with those who have to lend us billions of pounds every year.

The Government want us to believe that they are at least trying to help, but it is clear that this is a Janus-faced Government. As my right hon. Friend the Member for East Surrey said, the costs have not come off people’s bills, because the Government are just moving those costs to their tax bills. That is true, is it not? We are told to be grateful that energy bills—which are already up—are being shifted to our tax bills. The electric car grant that is coming in is not actually helping anyone. It is not a result of energy prices having gone down; it is being paid for with pay per mile, despite the fact that the Secretary of State for Transport said to my hon. Friend the Member for Bridlington and The Wolds (Charlie Dewhirst) at Transport questions that that would not happen. There have been more questions today from Members right across the House about how on earth one could implement such a scheme.

Let us have a look at the freeze on train fares. That is not being paid for through more efficient trains or more productivity; it is being paid for by tax rises. Fuel duty will rise by 5p next year, and bus fares are already up by 50%. That measure is fully funded—by taxpayers. It is funded by bus users and motorists up and down the country. That is the cost of this Government. When I saw the numbers in the Budget, I was quite astonished, because they totally contradict the figures that the Department for Transport has put out. The Department has said that the cost of this policy is £600 million, but the Budget says £150 million. When the Transport Secretary speaks, can we have some honesty and transparency about the cost?

The issue does not stop there—it goes even further. Taxes on flights are up to £400 for a family holiday, and those taxes are going up next year, and the year after. The taxi tax is coming in, hammering our night-time economy and leaving women with a choice between paying 20% more for a private hire vehicle, and being vulnerable late at night when trying to get home. The Government are raising business rates again on the high street, but also snuck out on the same day as the Budget were multiple-times increases resulting from the revaluation of airports and a 10-times rise for the channel tunnel rail link, from £10 million to £100 million.

[Sir John Hayes]

I endorse the point about automatic cars and Motability, and the very important point about banking hubs and the extension. Does my right hon. Friend recognise that when we add costs to businesses such as the retailer in my constituency that I visited recently, we pay the price in terms of the jobs that they might create, or otherwise? These are lost opportunities for constituents to get jobs in meaningful businesses, because business costs are rising as a result of this Government.

[Mr Holden]

My right hon. Friend has made an extremely important point. These taxes are hitting across the board, and they are hitting the employment of his constituents. That is on top of the tax rises that we saw last year: the changes in business property relief, business rates and agricultural property relief, and the national insurance tax rises. It is hammering working families up and down the country, while the Government pretend that it is not.

How on earth can the Secretary of State claim that this Budget will keep inflation down? Every policy choice that the Government make fires costs straight back into the system. It is happening with policy after policy, as if some giant socialist Gatling gun were spraying costs on to businesses, passengers, taxpayers and, indeed, the entire country.

[Iqbal Mohamed]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Holden]

I am afraid that I have no time to give way further.

Do the Government not understand that every time they hike up taxes, the cost of food goes up? Do they not understand that an indiscriminate tax hike means that the cost to the producer rises, the cost of getting the food to the shops rises, and the cost to the supermarket selling the food rises? It is a conveyor belt of wholly avoidable costs.

That brings me to the core of my argument. What are this Government actually for? Disposable incomes have been revised down, along with growth, while taxes, inflation and business rates are all up. What else is up? The number of entrepreneurs leaving the country. We thought it would be capital flight—in fact, that is what the Treasury was briefing out: real worries about capital flight—but it is not just capital flight; it is entrepreneurial flight. It is labour fleeing the country as well. People are leaving. The only thing left is land, and the Government are taxing that as well.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury made a very good point in his speech. He said that he had never seen such speculation ahead of a Budget that had worried family businesses—family businesses in his constituency and in mine. I have never known a Budget to be talked about as much as this Budget was in advance of its production. It is quite incredible. The economy is being harmed just by the briefing put out by the Government. They were doing it on the Prime Minister’s own plane. It is unbelievable.

However, it is not just small businesses that are being affected. We hear today that Zipcar, which is important to a great many people in London, will be closing its operations from the end of the year. That will have a huge impact, and it is happening because of the taxes on the company and the congestion charge imposed by the Mayor of London.

My hon. Friend the Member for Isle of Wight East (Joe Robertson) made a good point earlier when he said that, once upon a time, Labour talked of being the party of a hand up, not a handout. Well, Labour is now, quite clearly, the party with its hand in the pocket of working Britain. The hon. Member for Leeds East (Richard Burgon), the hon. Member for Salford (Rebecca Long Bailey) and my hon. Friend the Member for Bridgwater (Sir Ashley Fox) all made the same point; they are not normally on the same page, but they were today. They pointed out that it would be working people paying the price for those extra tax rises, because of thresholds that are frozen year after year owing to decisions made by this Labour Government.

The Government are not on the side of motor manufacturing either. Real concerns have been expressed by that sector, as was pointed out by the hon. Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Ruth Cadbury), the hon. Member for Ellesmere Port and Bromborough (Justin Madders), and my hon. Friend the Member for Hinckley and Bosworth (Dr Evans). How on earth, as the hon. Member for South Antrim (Robin Swann) asked earlier, will a pay-per-mile scheme work when people are crossing the border? Is the Labour party really going to tax people for driving on foreign roads? We shall have to see.

The hon. Member for Buckingham and Bletchley (Callum Anderson) made a very sensible point when he said that fiscal prudence was a means to an end. It is a means to the end of getting debt interest down, and keeping borrowing rates for businesses and families down. That is exactly right, but we did not see it from this Government. They think that people will not notice, but the Chancellor determinedly obfuscated about the figures. She talked of a black hole imposed on her, but in truth, taxes on working people are rising to pay for more welfare.

The Government think that people will not notice that they are being bribed with their own money, taken from them via the tax on electric vehicles and energy. They think that small businesses will not notice business rates going up, or national insurance taxes going up. But people have noticed. They have noticed the broken promises on tax, on working people and on bills. They have noticed the smoke and mirrors. The Government are robbing Peter, but not to pay Paul; they are robbing Paul too. People were worried ahead of the Budget this year, and now they are worried about what the third Labour Budget next year will deliver, because they know that this failing Government will be coming back for more.