Orders of the Day — Finance Bill.

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at on 21 May 1935.

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Photo of Mr Wilfred Paling Mr Wilfred Paling , Wentworth

I shall have a few things to say about employment before I sit down, and I am sure that the hon. Baronet will hear as much about it as he wants to hear from me. Money has been spent in subsidies—on milk, on marketing schemes, shipping, sugar beet, and £9,000,000 for the Cunarder; but none of this money has gone to the working class directly and very little of it indirectly. We are told that subsidies percolate from the people who get them to the working class in the form of wages, but since 1931 the wages of the working class people have not increased but, in the aggregate, have decreased, so the working people have not got it from that source. Not only are they paying more in indirect taxation but other impositions have been put on them. I would ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether it is his intention to take off the 2d. a week extra which was put on to the premiums under unemployment insurance. There was a cut in the benefits, and that has been restored, but the increased contribution remains and so far as I know there has never been a word said as to whether he has any intention of taking it off.