Amendment of the law

It is always good to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale, West (Mr. Brady)—which is what my hon. Friend, in turn, said about the right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field). They both made forceful and thoughtful speeches, showing great restraint in their timing; I shall do the same, as I know that at least one other Member wishes to contribute to the debate. First, I declare an interest as the proprietor of Evans News, a convenience store in Swansea that sells alcohol and cigarettes, for both of which this Budget has implications. Much has been said about the public debt that has been built up, and the enormous public debt that will be built up this year and next—the greatest public debt that this country has ever seen. Government Members accuse us of just wanting to cut public spending, but that is simply not the case. We want to see public spending improved in some key areas. As many hon. Members will know, after getting a super-bug infection in a Swansea hospital, my mother died on 27 March. Almost 10,000 people died of super-bug infections in 2007, and no Member wants to see avoidable deaths continue at the present level in our hospitals. To put the number of hospital deaths from super-bugs into context, fewer than 3,000 people died from accidents on the roads. Money should be directed towards ensuring that hospital infections are completely eradicated; they seemed not to occur at all 20 years ago, yet all of a sudden there are massive numbers of deaths. I wanted to raise that issue on behalf of my mother and others, but I shall not concentrate on it any further today. I wished to raise a number of points, but given the time constraints, I shall deal with only a few of them. Some hon. Members have already spoken about the support needed by small and medium-sized enterprises. Business rates clearly affect them, and although the Government have announced that the misery to be inflicted on SMEs will be spread out over more years, the fact remains that they will still have to suffer the pain of paying higher business rates. Some SMEs are marginal businesses, and some make hardly any money, so we must ensure that we support them properly, and find ways of limiting the business rates that they have to pay. I also want to say something about credit insurance, and also something about the short-time working subsidy, which the Government need to consider further. One campaign that I have been running, which has clearly been a complete flop, is the "Axe the Beer Tax" campaign. We saw further increases in taxation on beer today, yet 40 pubs close every week, and thousands of people are losing their jobs every year. Pubs are small and medium-sized enterprises, and we all know the great work that those iconic British institutions play in our communities, not just in rural areas, where they are particularly important, but throughout the country. Pubs have dual uses, and the rate at which they are closing has not been helped by the continuation of the taxation that the Chancellor has announced today. I have received a letter from the Government. We asked about a differential tax rate for beer pulled at the pump as opposed to beer sold in bottles and cans from supermarkets, but I am told that we cannot have that, because the EU will not allow it. I implore Ministers to go to Brussels, sit with the Commission and work out what it takes to change that directive, or law, so that we can start to support the great British pub again. I will leave that suggestion with the Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury; I know she is aware of the issue. The next issue is fuel, which my hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale, West mentioned. Fuel is almost reaching £1 a litre again—another increase was announced in the Budget today—and 70p of that £1 goes in taxation. It is not as if we operate in splendid isolation from other countries. We do not. My hon. Friend also mentioned hauliers, who are put at a competitive disadvantage. For my constituents in rural areas, cars are not luxuries. In many cases, no rural public transport whatever is available to them, so they need their cars. I ask the Government to look at the impact that that increase is having on rural drivers and people who need a car to go to work. Government must not simply take motorists for granted and impose ever-increasing rates of taxation on them. One area that the Government might reconsider, where we might be able to make substantial savings, is that of some public sector salaries—my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (Mr. Redwood) touched on this subject. MPs are pilloried in the papers for the amount that we earn, but my goodness, we are mere amateurs compared to some local authority chief executives and officers, and others who operate within the public sector. It has been recorded that more than 1,000 people who work in local authorities earn more than £100,000. At least 16 of them earn more than the Prime Minister, at more than £194,000. One earns more than £500,000. For goodness' sake, where is the pay restraint in local authorities? Pensioners and people living on limited and poor incomes are having to scrape together the money to pay their council tax, yet it is being siphoned off by an elite group who work for our local authorities. That must be looked at again. Such salaries must be capped. There has to be restraint in our local authorities. The other issue also involves the public sector, and there must be capping here, too. I serve on the Culture, Media and Sport Committee, and I always enjoy having Mark Thompson, the director-general of the BBC, give evidence before us—but he earns more than £800,000. I cannot believe that sort of money—and of course he also has expenses on top of that. Again, that makes MPs look like complete amateurs, as such people are trousering lots of money in expenses and showing no restraint whatever. The head of Network Rail earns £1.25 million a year. Adam Crozier of Royal Mail earns almost £1.25 million. Andy Duncan at Channel 4 earns £1,211,000. Where is the pay restraint in the public sector? One lady has just taken over as chairman of Ofcom; she works less than five days a week, and earns more than £200,000 a year. [Interruption.] I am informed that she works a three-day week. We know that there are quango heads who earn substantial sums for part-time work. Quite frankly, that shames us all, because we have lost the plot, and lost our grip. A lot of non-jobs are advertised in The Guardian and local papers up and down the country. If they did not exist, nobody would miss them, but my goodness, we would all benefit from saving the money that we are throwing at some of those non-jobs. I have been a Member of Parliament for nearly 17 years, and I have to say that this Budget, as a whole, is the grimmest Budget, for the grimmest conditions, that I have ever seen. We have had a bankrupt Budget from a bankrupt Government who now administer a bankrupt country. Each time the Chancellor said that he wanted to do something to help the country, I thought that he was going to announce his resignation, but sadly, he did not. The best thing that he and the rest of this Government could do would be to go to the country, and ask for the public's verdict on how they have conducted the country's affairs.