Morning:
6°c
Tories demand debate as MPs head off for break
Joe Murphy and Paul Waugh25 Nov 2008
George Osborne this afternoon demanded an emergency Commons debate on the huge rise in borrowing.
The shadow chancellor was protesting to the Speaker after ministers rebuffed Tory requests for a formal debate and vote on the £20billion mini-budget.
If Speaker Michael Martin agrees, Chancellor Alistair Darling would be hauled back to the Commons to defend and further explain the projected figures for state debt, as well as his VAT cut and future income tax rises.
MPs were furious that they were being sent away on a five-day weekend from Thursday to next Wednesday - the day of the Queen's Speech - instead of debating the pre-Budget report. It was hailed as the most significant tax-and-spend package outside a spring Budget since the crisis mini-budgets of the strike-bound Seventies.
If the tax changes were part of a spring Budget, there would be at least four days of Commons debates on the measures, with senior Cabinet ministers attending the Commons. MPs would then vote line by line on the Finance Bill enacting the changes.
Conservative whips believe a debate could be squeezed into the parliamentary timetable tomorrow, because the Opposition is willing to help speed through the Government's pensions legislation in a short time. But a Government official said there was no agreement on a PBR debate: "We have no plans to change the Commons business," he said.
Mr Osborne will argue that the immense size of the borrowing figures - up £118billion next year and by £300billion over five years - is so grave that a debate is necessary.
Earlier, the shadow chancellor said the Tories will oppose the VAT cut from 17.5per cent to 15 per cent, which will cost the Exchequer some £13billion.
He said people were "pretty shocked" by the disclosure that the country was plummeting a trillion pounds into debt.
"Every single person watching this programme owes, in effect, £34,000 on the national credit card," he told GMTV. "They are going to wake up, they are going to look at those headlines, listen to programmes like this and then realise the entire country now is very, very heavily in debt."
Mr Osborne mocked the idea that a 2.5 per cent cut in prices could revive the high streets at a time when panicky stores were offering pre-Christmas sales of 20 or 30 per cent off.
"We have got to get lending going in this economy again, you have got to get credit to small businesses, that is where the action is needed not, frankly, taking a huge risk with the public finances," he said, calling for interest rate cuts and the Government to underwrite bank loans to firms.
"These measures would do far more than a 2.5 per cent cut in VAT - a temporary cut which would be paid for later with massive tax rises."
By contrast, Mr Osborne confirmed for the first time that the Tories would not oppose the new 45p top rate of income tax for people earning over £150,000 a year. "Our priority is to help people on low incomes," he said.
The Conservatives were today claiming that the Treasury figures on who will gain and lose when taxes rise after 2011 were misleading. Mr Osborne claimed anyone earning more than £19,000 a year would be paying "higher taxes permanently".
Mr Darling hit the TV and radio studios to defend his measures as the "right thing" to help the economy through the recession. The Chancellor said the country was "moving into recession" and the choice was whether to inject money into the economy or leave people to sink or swim. "It seems only the Conservatives are saying, as they did in the Eighties and the Nineties, 'just walk away from people, leave them high and dry, let them sink or swim'," he claimed. "I just do not think that is the right thing to do. People expect the Government to help them."
Mr Darling denied that people earning below £40,000 would pay more tax and National Insurance, arguing that higher allowances for these income bands would compensate them for the rises that were highlighted by Mr Osborne.
"Of course, we have got to live within our means, so I have also had to take difficult decisions," Mr Darling said.
Reader views (15)
This is what happens when you have the most arrogant Government in history in conjunction with the weakest opposition in history. The Tories have been sitting on their backsides until it is too late.
- Roger, Staines., 26/11/2008 08:10
Report abuse
Why don't we have a proper government you ask! Well, there was no election... Nu Labor needs to go. We are entering the biggest recession of any developed country!
- Jacqueline, Hampstead, London, 25/11/2008 22:37
Report abuse
Brown and Darling don't have the guts to defend their policies and the rest of labour MPs would rather do anything rather than hold the Govt to account especially to have a long weekend before their extra long Xmas holiday!
- Dave, London, 25/11/2008 19:00
Report abuse
Five days off is good. Then they get three weeks for Christmas (no kidding). Good news for us all, because the less time they all spend in Westminster, the less time they have for screwing things up. If only we were French and itching to take to the streets.....
- John Problem, Hackney Wick, London, UK, 25/11/2008 18:54
Report abuse
I think Keith Price misses the point that Darling did not explain everything in his statement to the House. The Institute of Fiscal Studies has found him out. Far more losers than he told us. Secondly, Labourites may feel the measures he did announce were "necessary" - we do not all agree. A debate would enable grievances to be properly aired: but then the Government hates being held to account and shows increasing contempt fo its fellow citizens, so I won't hold my breath.
- James Elliott, Eastbourne UK, 25/11/2008 18:12
Report abuse
Well what do you expect? A debate needs to have a relatively meaningless topic for Labour such as fox-hunting which as we all know was discussed for 6 long weeks whereas the Iraq war was barely ever mentioned during that particular Parliament sitting.
The state of the British economy needs to be left to a miserable left-wing loonie such as boom & bust, the Great Leader, Brown to properly mis-manage. He is of course incapably assisted by dilatory Darling and the rambling calamity Cooper.
Remember, Labour 1997 till 2009; probably the worst Government in British history.
- Sickn Tired Of Labour, London, UK, 25/11/2008 17:25
Report abuse
As a pensioner, I will not be rushing out to spend more money now that a mere 2 1/2% VAT and a rise in my state pension hardly protects me from the price increases ahead! I want to save as much as possible to protect myself for the worse days still to come. Sadly, my children and grand children will be paying for the profligacy of this Government! It is fine for Mr Darling to declare we have to spend within our means. It's a pity his boss, Mr Gordon Brown, did not feel the same when he was our Chancellor of the Exchequer!
- Diana From Devon, Newton Abbt, UK, 25/11/2008 16:37
Report abuse
The Government has explained their necessary measures once already. What need is there to do it all again?
- Keith Price, Luton, England, 25/11/2008 16:35
Report abuse
Just how often do these idle overpaid scroungers actually
work? They spend considerably more time on holiday than any other profession, and they are the most grossly overpaid bunch of parasites in existence. No wonder the country is in such a mess. Hardly syurprising that people can't be bothered to vote!
- L.Taubler, London / UK, 25/11/2008 15:14
Report abuse
The Conservatives should know that democracy is dead in the UK and the EU thanks to the communist Labour gov.
- Frank, Home Counties, England, 25/11/2008 14:07
Report abuse
The Politburo (still) Rools OK.
- Bj, London, 25/11/2008 14:00
Report abuse
Heres one place that any party could save money get rid of these freeloading MPs
- Dave Smith, Croydon, 25/11/2008 13:39
Report abuse
What on earth have our 646 MPs done to deserve a long weekend? Run the economy into the ground: check. Bailed out the banks with £37bn of public money: check. Cut a few taxes today to be paid for in 3 years time: check.
Most of us are working every hour to stay in work, what's their excuse?
- Nobby Clark, Perth, Scotland, 25/11/2008 13:29
Report abuse
70% of our laws are decided in Brussels and the most important economic change in decades is announced with neither vote nor debate and still our politicians wonder why people are disenchanted with what is laughingly called democracy.
- Gill, Birmingham UK, 25/11/2008 11:01
Report abuse
Suppose that as we have finally cleared the WW11 loan in 2006 our government feels that raising another should be no problem. Wonder if they have forgotten that a sum is still outstanding for WW1.
- Tony Islander, Herts, 25/11/2008 10:15
Report abuse
