Finance Bill

I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman will know that it is the recommendation of the all-party group on climate change that we look again at banding issues. On our wider taxation policy, the Liberal Democrat tax commission will report in September—I am sure that he will watch for that with great interest—and we will respond to the changes made in this year’s Budget in that report. The point that I was about to make is that the changes are welcome, but the concern is that the price changes will not have any impact on the behaviour of some people living in rural areas, because there are no public transport alternatives for them. That holds true for the vehicle excise duty rises, as well as for increases in fuel duty. We made proposals last year to try to flag up that issue, and considered a discount for the first vehicle registered by a household in isolated rural areas. I draw the Minister’s attention to other options that the Treasury might consider that have been used in other areas where the issue has been recognised, and where people have sought to ameliorate it so that people for whom price will not make a difference do not suffer disproportionately. There is an EU derogation, which I understand is used in France, that assists isolated rural areas, and I understand that in Australia there are reliefs, as regards rural fuel stations, for drivers who are registered in an isolated rural area. That deals with the issue that my hon. Friend the Member for Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey (Danny Alexander) raised last year; he said that in remote areas such as the highlands, fuel prices are much higher, just because of transport costs. There are alternatives elsewhere in the world that I hope the Minister will consider. The environmental proposals in the Budget get one cheer, rather than three, not least because, to turn to the issue of stamp duty land tax for zero-carbon homes, which has already been raised, there are many other things that could be done to help to try to improve the efficiency of the many thousands of houses that will be built in forthcoming years. That issue was raised in debate on the Local Planning Authorities (Energy and Energy Efficiency) Bill, a private Member’s Bill introduced by a Labour Back Bencher, the hon. Member for Gower (Mr. Caton). The Bill sought to give more flexibility to local authorities to allow them to set higher environmental standards for new properties, but it was talked out by the Government, so there is an issue about the amount of cross-departmental co-operation that takes place to allow improvement to important environmental measures. Obviously, one of the key environmental measures in this year’s Budget and this year’s Finance Bill are the changes to air passenger duty. The changes were introduced without the House having the opportunity to debate or vote on them. We should combine that with the fact that many thousands of passengers had bought their tickets before the changes were introduced on 1 February; there are a lot of disgruntled people out there who see that kind of tax change as a means of raising money. It has done nothing but make people more cynical about any other tax proposals that the Government make to reduce emissions. I note that the Treasury Committee’s report on the pre-Budget report, in which the changes were announced, said:"““As a general rule, we consider that, where increases in rates of duties or taxes are proposed in the Pre-Budget Report, those increases should not come into force until after the House of Commons has had an opportunity to come to a formal decision on the proposed increase following the Budget.?" The Treasury Committee went on to say:"““We draw the attention of the House of Commons to the unusual timing of the implementation of the increases in Air Passenger Duty, for which the Treasury has not cited any relevant precedents.?" I invite the Minister to cite any relevant precedents on the Floor of the House today, and to explain why the time scale that was used was adopted. That is important, because we are talking about credibility, public confidence about whether such measures are being taken for the right reasons, and ensuring an opportunity for debate. One of the other frustrations about the increases in air passenger duty is that they bear no relation to how busy the flight is, to the aeroplane’s emissions or to its fuel-efficient. We must therefore question what impact they can have on changing behaviour. As an alternative, the Conservatives have suggested giving everybody an allowance for one long-distance flight a year, and possibly a limited number of short-haul flights, but that would create another database of everyone’s movements and be impossible to monitor. Nevertheless, there are alternatives that the Government could and should investigate. Although they can be set out in more detail in Committee, it would be interesting to know at this stage whether the Government have considered applying to aviation similar principles to those that apply to vehicle excise duty, taking account of different sizes of planes, their differing emissions and their destinations. Such an approach would be useful in preparing for permit trading for aviation emissions—assuming that the Government are committed to that principle in the long term—because it would have to relate to how full flights are, the efficiency of aeroplanes, and the distances they are travelling.