Now that we have reached the final stages of consideration of the Finance Bill, may I join the Minister in commending all hon. Members in all parts of the House who took part in the scrutiny, and in considering all the details? As he said, there were 31 hours of consideration of the Bill. I particularly pay tribute to my hon. Friends the Members for Kilmarnock and Loudoun (Cathy Jamieson), for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell), and for Birmingham, Ladywood (Shabana Mahmood). Let us be honest: they did the heavy lifting in Committee and on Report, as did—in an equal but perhaps less audible way—my hon. Friend the Member for Scunthorpe (Nic Dakin), the Opposition Whip, who made sure we kept to time and that everything was pursued diligently. Many hon. Members, certainly from the Opposition side of the Chamber, pushed Ministers and probed on specific matters of policy, and I grant that Ministers tried to
address many of those points, though they were ably assisted, I suspect, by the officials from the Treasury, who also put a lot of work into these Finance Bills.
The Bill is long on clauses but short on ambition, I am afraid. I said on Second Reading that our goal was to try to improve the specifics. We have tried our best in a number of areas, but I fear we have not always succeeded in persuading Ministers to see the error of their ways. Let us consider some of these specifics, such as the crass and ill-timed tax cut for investment fund managers through the abolition of stamp duty reserve tax. At a time when so many people in this country are struggling with cuts to tax credits, such as the bedroom tax, and finding it difficult to make ends meet, the Government’s priority was to give that support and help first and foremost to those poor, hard-up investment fund managers. It is a badge of shame that that was their priority.