It is difficult to tell what we can afford as the Conservative party, in government since 2010, has consistently failed to meet financial targets for dealing with the deficit. The Opposition agree with the Government that the deficit needs to be tackled, but we disagree on the way in which it should be done. Forgoing £2.5 billion —if that is the exact figure, and I think my hon. Friend is probably right that it is of that order of magnitude—in a very regressive way is something that Labour Members would not countenance, but we need to look at the whole regime, hence the wording of new clause 9.
There will also be complications with the wording of the inheritance tax provisions. There is a feeling of unfairness among some as to the definitions—which I will not go through tonight—of a linear descendent. Many, if not all, Members will know from our own lives, advice surgeries and places we live that the definition of a family and those who are regarded by someone as being a member of their family are somewhat fluid in our society, and have become much more fluid in the last 50 years in terms of social recognition. For example, the Labour Government introduced civil partnership legislation, which I welcome—it is possible this Parliament will extend that to opposite-sex couples—and, commendably, in the last Parliament gay marriage was put on to the statute book. Those are concrete examples, dealt with by this House, of the fluidity and changing nature of family structures, but the provisions in this Bill rather lock in whether somebody is, or is not, regarded as a member of a family. Inheritance tax in
this Bill is a bit of a problem, therefore, and I urge the Government to accept new clause 9 and amendment 89, which in a sense is a stand part motion.
I will now turn to value added tax, enforcement by deduction from accounts and the climate change levy—unless any Member wishes a quick run-around again on inheritance tax, but I suspect not.