Public Expenditure

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 3:45 pm on 21 December 1999.

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Photo of Andrew Tyrie Andrew Tyrie Conservative, Chichester 3:45, 21 December 1999

We have been unable to elicit any answer from the Liberal Democrats on what tax burden they would wish to impose. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will be able to tell us what he thinks the savings ratio should be if we are to have a prosperous economy.

I shall speak briefly about debt and public spending, then about economic management over the past couple of years. On debt, the right hon. Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Mr. Sheldon)—a former Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee who is also no longer in his place—alluded to what he called the Government's excellent performance in reducing the debt burden and the deficit. He failed completely to grasp the fact that those issues can be considered intelligently only in the context of the business cycle. It is easy to reduce debt and the deficit during an upswing. It is difficult—indeed, usually impossible—to do so during a downswing.

The Conservative record on debt and the deficit—particularly debt—was without doubt the best achieved by any Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development country over the lifetime of the last Conservative Government. I have the figures, should anyone wish to challenge them. Every other major country increased its debt stock during that period; the United Kingdom enjoyed a net fall. That was an astonishing achievement. The sharp rise to which Labour always alludes was a consequence of the recession in the early 1990s, by which the UK was particularly badly affected.