It is a pleasure to take part in the debate. We have heard fantastic maiden speeches from across the House, and I am sure that we have all enjoyed the insights from them.
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Chipping Barnet (Dan Tomlinson).
I loved the way he set out his aspiration for the kind of country of abundance that we should seek.
He is entirely right, but I am just not sure that this Budget is the way to get there.
If the penny drops with him over time, I hope that he will be able to engage with us in coming up with a more constructive way of delivering the growth that this country needs.
Not only is this a Budget of broken promises, but unfortunately—and this is an important issue—it is a bad faith Budget. I do not want to rehearse—although there is so much to rehearse—the 50 promises not to raise taxes or the bogus £22 billion that was not validated by the OBR, but those are serious points.
It is good to see the engagement from Labour Members, because in politics one cannot afford to have a reputation for being dishonest and not doing what one says.
Labour Members who laugh at that should remember Cicero’s advice. He was always better at giving advice than following it, but he said: “The foundation of justice is…good faith; that is, truth and fidelity to promises and agreements.”
Without that, we lose trust.
Unfortunately, 9.7 million people, including 15,000 of my constituents, believed the promises of the now Labour Government, and even 410 Members of Parliament thought that they were being honest.
I think people do feel betrayed. We need to conduct our politics as honestly as we can. The Labour Government broke their promise not to raise taxes on working people, because, as the OBR has made clear, of the NICs raise will overwhelmingly fall on working people.
In fact, if we go through the numbers, as I did, it turns out that there is a bigger reduction in wages than there is net receipt to the Exchequer.
That is quite a remarkable achievement—probably only a Labour Government could do that.
Of course, the Government have also put up the cost of getting on the bus.
If ever there was a symbol of working people, travelling from my constituency to a low-paid job in Hull, that is it.
It will cost them £500 a year extra out of taxed income.
I do not know why the hon. Member for Hitchin (Alistair Strathern) is grinning—I know he grins a lot, but it should not be funny to him that someone in a low-wage job who travels into Hull every day will pay £500 a year more because of the decisions his Government are making. For a couple, it is £1,000 a year.
That cost is real, and it should not be glossed over.
There is just one train station in my constituency, and people who live in Withernsea have no choice but to travel 26 miles to get there.
The Prime Minister’s constituents are blessed with a pick and mix of ways to get to the office: the tube, the overground, trains, Ubers, Bolts, and even Boris bikes.
That is not the case in rural and coastal East Yorkshire: my constituents get the bus at 7 o’clock in the morning, and they get another bus at 6 o’clock at night.
That is their lived reality, and the serious impact of this Budget should be recognised.
Another broken promise was to pensioners, who were told that they would have security in retirement—that their benefits would not be touched.
Taking £300 from the very poorest pensioners is not keeping that promise. The very poorest pensioners are those eligible for pension credit.
I will not. The very poorest pensioners are those eligible for pension credit, and nearly 900,000 of them will not get that £300. That is the truth—there is no point denying it.
Finally, there is the awful betrayal of British farmers, many of whom work from dawn to dusk to ensure our supermarkets are full of fresh fruit and veg.
According to my constituent William Hodgson, who runs a small family farm near Withernsea, it is a “rural catastrophe”.
I ask the Government to think again.
The text of this speech is taken from Hansard, on 6th November 2024
