Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation

The hon. Gentleman slept through the Chancellor's statement; I am glad to see that he has woken up for my reply. Does he know where we stand today? Having been fourth in the world for tax and regulation, we are now 84th and 86th. We have gone from the top of the premier league to the bottom of the conference in 13 wasted years—and we say that it is time to sack the manager. No wonder "Match of the Day" did not want him. So that is the mess: what about their plans to clear it up? Pitiful. The big argument in British politics today is this: they say, "Don't do anything before the election—let's just sit tight and keep our fingers crossed"; we say that we need real action to get our economy moving, and urgently. We need a credible plan to deal with Britain's record debts, starting now, and we need to show the world that we are back open for business. Let us start with the debt. The Chancellor repeated his hope to halve the deficit by 2014. Let us be clear about what this means. It means that in four years' time we will have a deficit almost as big as when Denis Healey went to the IMF in the 1970s. We are not the only ones who think that this is completely inadequate. The CBI has said:""Current plans to halve the deficit over four years are too little, too late."" The OECD has said that""more ambitious fiscal…plans…would strengthen the recovery."" The European Commission says that the Government's plans are "not sufficiently ambitious". The Prime Minister used to bang on about how we needed a "global early warning system"—do we all remember that one? Well, how many more warnings does he need? The lights are flashing and the alarm bells are ringing, but he is ignoring them and doing nothing for this country. A credible plan requires action now, and all we got was delay. The risk to recovery is not in dealing with the deficit now—it is in not dealing with the deficit now. The Prime Minister and the Chancellor are having a good chat—they are probably discussing what sort of fees they can charge after the next election. They should listen. Every family knows that when your debts mount up you need to start paying them off or things only get worse, and it is time for the Government to learn the same lessons. The Prime Minister and the Chancellor—