Jobs and Growth

Part of Debate on the Address – in the House of Commons at 2:18 pm on 17 May 2012.

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Photo of George Mudie George Mudie Chair, Statutory Instruments (Joint Committee), Chair, Statutory Instruments (Select Committee), Opposition Whip (Commons), Chair, Statutory Instruments (Joint Committee), Chair, Statutory Instruments (Select Committee) 2:18, 17 May 2012

Before I begin my remarks on the Queen’s Speech, I should like to compliment my right hon. Friend David Miliband on his very good speech. We all have opinions, but to put the facts in such a clear fashion that cannot be argued with proves why he is a loss sitting on the Back Benches. I am not a natural supporter of his, as he knows, but the Front Bench is his place, not the Back Benches—[ Interruption. ] It is a shame; that is absolutely right.

This Queen’s Speech is almost a re-run of the Budget speech. There are three financial Bills: the pensions Bill, the banking reform Bill, and the enterprise and regulatory reform Bill. This last has parts that may be acceptable, although they will have to be teased out and looked at, but other parts are worrying. Of the remaining Bills, some are good or desirable in their own fashion. In the context of the dangers and difficult problems facing the British economy and the need to get growth and a rebalancing of the economy, the Queen’s Speech offers very little. That is very disappointing, and it will make the public, who are worrying about their families, their homes, their futures and their children’s futures, wonder about how out of touch the House of Commons is with their worries.

The Queen’s Speech projects our spending the majority of our time on a Bill to reform the House of Lords. How sensible will that seem to the families out there who are treading water financially? We must remember that 80% of the public sector cuts are still to come, so we are not at the worst stage; we have almost not even started. Yet this Bill, on which there is no consensus in the House and which is fiercely opposed by Members from all parties, will take up a lot of time here and in the House of Lords. One wonders why we are doing it. The public will ask, “Have they nothing better to do?” As a result, we will not have a social care Bill in this Session—that is a disgrace—and nor will we have a higher education Bill, which would be crucial to the growth strategy. No one can say that the Government have got their priorities right.

My right hon. Friend Mr Darling got something that Labour Members have long wanted—an acceptance from the Chancellor that growth is necessary to run alongside the cuts. That was quite an achievement and quite good news. The sad news, however, is that when the Chancellor read out all the measures that he felt would deal with growth, they were all on the supply side, not the demand side. It is clear that the big corporates are flush with money and could invest today and tomorrow, but they are not doing so because they have no confidence in the economy and there is no demand in the economy. The sooner that confidence is brought back, and the sooner the Chancellor understands that he has to put demand into the economy to get people into jobs with money and the confidence to spend, the better.