Capital Gains Tax (Rates)

Debate between Yvette Cooper and Anne McGuire

Monday 28th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Yvette Cooper]

That is a very generous invitation, which I shall pass on to the right hon. Gentleman.

Where are the figures for the analysis of the impact of those proposals on homelessness? Where are the figures for their impact on families who will not be able to pay their rent? Does the right hon. Gentleman have any idea how expensive it is to keep a family in temporary accommodation? That is the problem. That proposal is just like the proposal on unemployment. If the Government do not provide the support up front, it will cost them more later on in terms of dealing with homelessness.

As for supporting families, not even in the worst of the Thatcher years did the Government ever introduce a Budget that hit children so hard. Of the £8 billion that this Budget raises from direct tax and benefit changes, however, £3 billion directly hits children: cutting the child trust fund and the value of child benefit, and overall cuts in child tax credit. That is even before we add the cuts that families face in housing benefit, free school meals, free swimming, the future jobs fund and university places. This is a savage Budget for children. The Government claim that it will be all right because there is not a measured increase in child poverty as a result of this Budget. Of course there is not, because the Treasury model will not measure the impact of changes to VAT or housing benefit, and it will not look ahead any further than 2012-13, before many of the cuts bite.

Look at the people the Secretary of State is hitting hardest—the very youngest children of all. Gone is the baby tax credit, so some mums will now find they cannot afford to stay at home for as long as they want with their little babies. Gone is our plan for a toddler tax credit, gone is the pregnancy grant, and cut is the Sure Start maternity allowance. Has he no idea at all that supporting a family and getting the children out of poverty when the babies are born can save money from the public purse for years to come? Instead, he wants to cut support from the babes in their mothers’ arms. At least Margaret Thatcher had the grace to wait until the children were weaned before snatching their support.

[Mrs Anne McGuire (Stirling) (Lab)]

Does my right hon. Friend recognise that the Child Poverty Action Group has said that this is a disappointing Budget in terms of child poverty and that it will make it very difficult to meet the targets for the eradication of child poverty already set by the previous Labour Government?

[Yvette Cooper]

My right hon. Friend is right. When one takes account of what the Government are doing to housing benefit and VAT, the real consequence of this Budget is that it will push people, including children, into poverty. We remember how the Conservatives did this before in the ’80s: they cut jobs and cut the help for people to get into jobs, they cut the support for people who could not find jobs, they cut help for pensioners, and they cut support for families and ramped up the VAT bills for them to pay. We also remember how those cuts cost us more for generations to come. It cost more to deal with people on the dole, it cost more to help families who were made homeless, and it cost more to deal with the long-term effects on communities devastated by unemployment.

These unfair cuts are not driven by good budgeting. They will cost our economy and they will cost our public finances, too. This is an ideologically driven Budget by a party that simply wants to cut the size of the state, no matter who gets in the way. The truth is that the Conservatives have the youngest, the oldest, the poorest, the weakest and the most vulnerable in their sights. The nasty party is back—only this time they brought along their mates. Shame on them. Both parties have broken their promises; now they want to break Britain too, and we will fight them all the way.