Oral Answers to Questions

Stewart Hosie Excerpts

Tuesday 7th June 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

My hon. Friend is right to point out all the good things that are happening in Newark. Across the east midlands, we have seen the creation of 53,000 new small and medium-sized businesses since we came into Downing Street—a remarkable achievement. We have to ensure that we continue to move people up the job scale and that their wages continue to grow. The good news is that of the jobs being created at the moment 80% or so are full time and the majority are in skilled occupations.

[Stewart Hosie (Dundee East) (SNP)]

We all know the benefits of innovation to business and to the economy, so why does the Chancellor think his decision to change innovation support from grants to loans is anything other than a bad idea that will increase cost and risk to companies seeking to innovate?

[Mr Osborne]

I think the hon. Gentleman would accept, as I would, that it has been a challenge for the UK to turn good inventions in the laboratory into good inventions in the workplace that sell around the world. Our innovation support has had to be updated and modernised. The idea of loans is actually borrowed from a French initiative that has worked well in that economy, in terms of turning scientific invention into good products in the marketplace.

[Stewart Hosie]

That is a rather unconvincing answer. Of course it is not simply about innovation, but exports. We all understand the benefits to business and the economy of exporting more, so why does the Chancellor think it is a remotely good idea to take the decision to cut the UK Trade & Investment budget by £42 million over the next four years, making it more difficult to export and more difficult for him to meet his own target of doubling exports by the end of the decade?

[Mr Osborne]

Over the past five or six years, we have greatly increased the UKTI budget, but as with every Department, since it is paid for by the taxpayers that the hon. Gentleman and I represent, we need to make sure we get value for money. The new head of UKTI is ensuring that the money is going to the frontline to support small and medium-sized Scottish exporters and others in selling around the world. He should welcome the enormous success of many Scottish businesses, from the whisky business to agricultural industries and manufacturing, in exporting around the world, with the support of UKTI—the clue is in the first two letters.