Mr Brian Walden: I agree with the point the hon. Gentleman is making, and in a recent letter to my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer I made the same point relating to one of my constituents. Would it not be more logical to meet this problem if the Liberal Party were to press my right hon. Friend to remedy the worst injustices of our tax system by deducting these essential travelling expenses...
Mr Brian Walden: I am very uneasy about what is happening here today, and I am all themore uneasy because I have no particular stircture either on the Government or on the Opposition parties, and no strong feeling either way about this tax. In the first place, I do not blame the Government for introducing it. Whatever may be urged by hon. Members, its introduction barely keeps pace with the rate of inflation...
Mr Brian Walden: That is a good point for me to conclude on. It is exactly that sort of opinion that worries me most.
Mr Brian Walden: I am an old friend of the hon. Gentleman's, so he will know that I am not attacking him personally when I reply that it is too easy. VAT could easily become like income tax. Does the House ever have a serious discussion that is likely to change anything about the level of income tax that the Government say they want? I have been in the House for a long time. It is always the same story....
Mr Brian Walden: I am sure that the hon. Gentleman can see that my point was that the real rôle of the House of Commons ought to be to persuade the Government to leave people more of their own money in their pockets rather than for hon. Members to try to claw back certain concessions on tax levied. The people the hon. Gentleman has just mentioned would be much better off as a result of a 10p cut in their...
Mr Brian Walden: In the short time that I intend to speak, I do not want to follow the Opposition Front Bench in a discussion of whether the Government should bring more certainty into their pronouncements. I am dubious about the value of pronouncements anyway, whether certain or uncertain, and I do not want to talk about Leyland or about the Budget—only about Chrysler. I do not recall an occasion when I...
Mr Brian Walden: Moreover, on the arguments which the hon. Member for Bridg- water, who is interrupting me from a sedentary position, put today, it is the contention of the Opposition that it never will make any profit. What kind of lunatic would wish to put up the price on that assessment?
Mr Brian Walden: I do not for one second agree that it had anything to do with a great reduction in potential liability, which I do not believe has taken place. But I want to move on from this point. I offer the hon. Gentleman an agreement. Let him go to the bedside of the hon. Member for Henley with some friendly brokers and put his case. When they have done laughing at him, they will tell him what actually...
Mr Brian Walden: The charge is nonsense, and unpleasant nonsense, I might add. There is no truth in it whatsoever. Then, when they have done with alleging that the Government are giving money to the American shareholders, the Opposition—at least, a large section of them; certainly the Front Bench, I take it—contend that Chrysler should have been allowed to collapse. Apparently, in some way which has...
Mr Brian Walden: That is 25,000 from Chrysler alone and an ancillary figure of at least 30,000. That is my view, the Government's view and other people's view. In view of what I shall be saying, however, one can lop a little off that and work it out to the figure that I shall give of what this would have cost. This would not have been unemployment shared at the rate of 100 each in every constituency in the...
Mr Brian Walden: It is not rubbish. It is the plain truth. There is not enough alternative work there. It would have raised the unemployment rate in Coventry, which is already well above the national average to about one-sixth of the work force. Most importantly of all, however, if one takes account of the additional unemployment benefit which would have had to be paid and the loss of income tax from men who...
Mr Brian Walden: The hon. Gentleman is right. I have great sympathy indeed with the right hon. Gentleman whom he has just named. I do not think that the hon. Gentleman can answer the arguments which have been made. I do not think he has any intention of trying, except on the non-sensical assumption, which is what the Opposition's case depends on, that the employment prospects in this country are so splendid...
Mr Brian Walden: We do? If the hon. Gentleman has any suggestions in that regard for the people in Linwood and Coventry who have lost their jobs, I suggest that he hurries at once to the local labour exchanges to tell them where those jobs are.
Mr Brian Walden: Of course, 400,000 people find jobs. There is a very high degree of labour mobility in this country, much higher than is conceded by the party opposite on the election platform. But we are not talking about that. We are talking about 400,000 jobs a month plus 55,000 new permanent jobs. Nobody with any sense believes that such jobs are available. My next point concerns the finances of the...
Mr Brian Walden: If the hon. Gentleman is going to use figures, he might as well get them right. I was talking about £55 million. There will be 8,000 redundancies. The hon. Gentleman is already talking more about the ancillary workers.
Mr Brian Walden: Ancillary workers.
Mr Brian Walden: It will be.
Mr Brian Walden: An American friend of mine said recently that he thought Britain was a bewildered nation with an uncertain future. I did not dissent very strongly but I added that I believed that the whole industrialised West was a bewildered area with an uncertain future. I confess fully to my share of bewilderment and uncertainty. Perhaps that accounts for the fact that I have managed to agree with quite...
Mr Brian Walden: Then I am in very good company. The hon. Gentleman knows very well how difficult it is to secure a monetarist who will supply a precise definition of what he wants. I am assuming that what is wanted is what is generally arguedt in the speeches of, for instance, the hon. Member for Oswestry (Mr. Biffen), the hon. Member for St. Ives and, if I may dare to make reference to a person who is no...
Mr Brian Walden: I take note of that comment, Mr. Deputy Speaker. I was about to meet the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Mr. Cant). I want to be clear and wish to deceive nobody. I did not say that monetarism was economic nonsense. I said that it did not matter whether it was or was not because it was of no practical use to the Government whatever. It could never be...
