Taxation: Beer and Pubs — [Albert Owen in the Chair]

Part of the debate – in Westminster Hall at 3:28 pm on 31 October 2017.

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Photo of John Grogan John Grogan Labour, Keighley 3:28, 31 October 2017

I think that John Lamont has tempted many of us to renew our acquaintance with pubs in the borders. It is a particular pleasure to take part in the debate, as it was secured by a true champion of the pub—Mike Wood.

Having retired in 2010 from chairmanship of the all-party group on beer and from Parliament, I might have thought that my days of speaking in such debates were long gone; so I am delighted to say a few words today. In those days I represented the constituency of Selby, which included Tadcaster—still the only town in England that can boast three major brewers. In Keighley, which I now represent, there is one major brewer—Timothy Taylor’s, which dates back to 1858. It is a byword for quality in the beer industry, with brewers who trained at that icon of higher education in brewing, Heriot- Watt University—perhaps the leading university in the field. There was a minor hiccup in relations between Timothy Taylor’s and the all-party group when I voted—it seems so long ago—to ban fox hunting. The then managing director, Charles Dent, promptly resigned his involvement with the group. I can assure the House that this summer in typical Yorkshire fashion, over a pint at Headingley, we let bygones be bygones. I am very much in dialogue with Timothy Taylor’s. There are also breweries such as Wharfedale, Bridgehouse, Wishbone, Haworth steam brewery, Ilkley and, just outside the constituency, Goose Eye.

There has been a lot of talk about statistics; I want to underline just two. One in seven of all the jobs created since 2010 have been in this sector. What has not so far been expressed is how quickly people can rise up this industry; it is, if not unique, then certainly renowned for that. Some £1 billion from Yorkshire goes in taxation from the pubs and brewing industry to the Exchequer—about the same amount that goes from Northern Ireland, as Jim Shannon said. If only we had a Yorkshire Mayor spending that money! We truly would have devolution.

I want to make four quick points. We should encourage beer exports, and there has been quite a movement towards that from the industry. Some have suggested that export sales should be excluded from the brewers’ volume for duty purposes, as a way of encouraging exports. That should be considered.

The hon. Member for Dudley South was right that under the Labour Government and under the coalition, the beer duty escalator did a great deal of harm. It is good to see Andrew Griffiths in his place, because he achieved what I certainly did not, and I hope that future chairs of the all-party beer group will achieve similar things. He got rid of the beer duty escalator. This is a crucial year for the reputation of the Conservative party and its relationship to the beer industry. Will those three years be known as the Burton interregnum or will we have not just beer duty relief, but rate relief? We clearly need an extension of £1,000 to £5,000 on rate relief this year.

Turning to small breweries’ duty relief, Gordon Brown has been agonising in recent days about his lack of empathy. Whatever the truth of that, he will always be known as the friend of small brewers—it is one of his great legacies—because of that massive change to our economy. At some stage, we will have to look at whether that can be extended. Many family brewers are losing out. They feel that they do not have the advantage of the duty rate relief and do not have the economies of scale that big brewers have.