Finance Bill

The hon. Gentleman has made an effective partisan point in his own way. That is also my understanding of the position. However, this is a serious debate, and I do not think we expected the Liberal Democrats to come up with a means of solving the problem for our constituents. We heard a long diversionary diatribe that might have been appropriate in a grand Second Reading debate or as part of heated exchanges, but now, on Report, we are trying to find a working solution, and there are solutions on offer. We naturally look to the Minister for leadership, because she has access to the figures and because she and her colleagues were the architects of the circumstances that caused this particular problem. I urge her again to recognise just how much people are hurting out there. Anyone who has been involved in recent political campaigns anywhere in the country will know that the dominant issue on the doorsteps is people's fear of going to the supermarket because the price of food has gone up again, their fear of filling up the car because the price of petrol has gone up again, and their fear of receiving energy bills because the price of energy is going up again. Their wages, for good reasons, are not going up by enough to compensate for that. We all know that there will have to be a real squeeze on people, but it perplexes us that the squeeze is to be more intense on those on the lowest incomes because of this tax proposal. Let me say again to the Minister that we need some kind of offset to tackle that particular twist of the knife. As every Member in the House knows, I am a passionate tax-cutter: I always want lower taxes. However, I am keen for the disproportionate benefit of that tax reduction to be felt lower down the income scale, particularly at a time when there is a real fear of the family bills because of the sudden surge of price increases, and a worry that there may be job losses and worse to come as the credit crunch and the squeeze intensify.