I will not give way for now.
Instead, the Government’s priority has been the married couple’s tax allowance—hardly the here and now help clamoured for outside the Westminster village. What does it amount to in practice? It totals £3.80 for the couples who qualify, at a cost to the Exchequer of £500 million. I note that earlier the Chief Secretary to the Treasury refused an opportunity to stand at the Dispatch Box and confirm his support for the measure. It does not look as if he wants to do that now. His silence says all that needs to be said.
The policy is slightly random; it excludes widows, widowers and people living on their own, for the sake of outcomes that are far from clear. It will help just one third of married couples, 84% of the gainers will be men, and just one in six families with children will benefit. What about the rest? There is nothing in the here and now for them either. What could the Government have done? For starters, they could have scrapped the married couple’s tax allowance and brought in a lower 10p starting rate of tax, which we have called for and which would help 24 million taxpayers, including 12 million people who are married, and almost half of whom—46%—would be women.