It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Stalybridge and Hyde (Jonathan Reynolds). He will not be surprised to hear that I disagree with almost every point he made, but he did at least try to present his argument in a reasoned way, which is more than some of his colleagues did.
I welcome three things above all in the Budget. First, there are the measures to strengthen British competitiveness, creating more jobs and boosting exports, and particularly cutting national insurance for under-21s and increasing the business investment allowance and financial support for exporters. These are things that are important for jobs, a sustainable recovery and dealing with the productivity puzzle that still afflicts the British economy. Let us not forget that growth is what produces the revenue to pay for our precious public services.
The second thing that I welcome is the great honesty from the Chancellor about the need to go further in tightening our grip on our debts. Further cuts in Whitehall spending will be necessary, as has been said, as will a long-term limit on welfare spending. These are critical. The idea that the spending restraint we have been under is now at an end is not credible or financially sustainable. We will have to keep on making difficult decisions, and I welcome the Chancellor’s honesty.
We talk a lot about Government debt but not so much about household debt. Household debt has in fact come down by £187 billion since 2009 when it was at its peak under the previous Government, and that is important because if interest rates go up, which they will at some point, small businesses with tight loans and mortgages will need to be vigilant to make sure that they can cope. It is important that we get household debt down. The further measures in the Budget on savings were welcome as well.
Thirdly, we have provided support for working families with the cost of living, in particular the tax break for child care up to £2,000 per child. We know that for low or middle-income families across the country the cost of child care is incredibly important. We inherited the second highest child care cost in the OECD from the previous Government, and it is right that the Government take measures to ease that burden.
For those three reasons, the Budget has been widely endorsed by small businesses through the Federation of Small Businesses and the British Chamber of Commerce as well as by bigger businesses through the Institute of Directors, but also by consumer groups such as Which? and Saga. The Budget helped build on the economic record of the coalition, bearing in mind the horrendous deficit and debt that we inherited from the previous Government. We have the fastest growth in the G7, and 1.7 million private jobs have been created under the coalition. Let us remember that in less than four years that is double the rate of private sector jobs growth that Labour achieved in a decade, so it is a huge comparative achievement.
We have done all this fairly. How many times have we heard from Opposition Members that this was a Budget for millionaires and the lowest paid have suffered? Let us be clear about the facts from HMRC. This financial year, someone earning £10,000 to £15,000 is paying 47% less income tax than in the last tax year under Labour. A millionaire is paying 14% more tax. Opposition Members have gone on and on about tax fairness; in fact, it is this Government who are delivering.
Equally, on the current statistics, child poverty, elderly poverty and fuel poverty are all lower than under Labour. Those are the facts, independently verified by all government and other providers of those statistics. Tough decisions have had to be made, but they have been made in a fair way.
We have heard a lot about the cost of living, but the best way to help anyone out of the rut that we know exists is to create more jobs, and unemployment is down from 8% to 7.2%. Youth unemployment is down by 17,000 from the level that was left by the previous Government. I agree with impatient Members on both sides of the House that we have to do more for young people, but it is about job creation, and that will happen only with the dynamism of the private sector.
We have taken 2.4 million of the lowest paid out of tax. We are supporting working families, not just with child care tax breaks but with measures on fuel duty, the council tax and affordable homes. No one would like to see more done to build affordable homes than I would, but we have to look at the facts. The average rate of affordable home building over the 13 years of the previous Government was 31,000 per year, compared with 48,000 per year under this Government. We are doing 50% better than the previous Government. Those
are the facts. For all the talk about the spare room subsidy and the problems of supply, we have built more homes on average in the tough times than the Labour Government did when the money was flowing easily and without restraint.
This has been a transformational Budget for savers, and that is absolutely critical. Auto-enrolment into pensions, the abolition of the 10p rate for low-income savers, the pensioner bond, the flexible pension limits and the increase in the ISA limit to £15,000 are incredibly important. Private saving is important so that people can cater for themselves into old age but also for our long-term competitiveness. Our low rate of private saving is one of the things that the World Economic Forum rankings have picked up. The measures introduced in this Budget are critical to correcting that. Opposition Members have ridiculed the increase in the ISA limit to £15,000 as if no one could afford it. I have to tell them that basic rate tax payers are a majority of those currently investing in ISAs, and it shows the contempt that the Labour party has for aspirational Britain that it mocks the increase in the ISA limit. Many people on low and middle incomes will want to take advantage of it.
This is a good Budget for business, for working families and for savers, and I commend the Treasury team.
5.9 pm