Not only the House but the whole country will welcome the candour with which the Secretary of State has now confessed that tit has been a deliberate policy of the Government for eight years to switch the burden from central taxation to rates. Is it not also the case, however, as Treasury figures published yesterday demonstrate, that the burden of central taxation for the average family with two children far from decreasing in those eight years, has gone up by about £20 per week? So, the result of the Government's policies after eight years is a massive increase in the rates—the direct result of policy, as he has just said—and an increase in the burden of central taxation as well. What bigger failure could there be than that?