Daisy Cooper

The country is paying the price for two anti-growth Labour Budgets. Growth has flatlined, youth unemployment is up, and the cost of living crisis grinds on, pushing people and businesses to the brink. So we plead with the Chancellor: please, for the sake of our country, put a laser-like focus on getting a better trade and defence deal with Europe so that we can protect our country, get Britain growing again and end the cost of living crisis. The Chancellor said that she will make an announcement about trade relationships in a couple of weeks, but the Government are already 18 months in. The Chancellor could have used today’s spring statement to announce the Government’s intention to negotiate a new UK-EU customs union to kick-start growth, cut red tape for business and build ties with our reliable allies in the face of Trump’s chaos. Why didn’t she? The spring statement comes at a critical time for our national and economic security. OBR projections will soon be out of date. Trump’s illegal actions in Iran this weekend will be felt in people’s pockets right here in Britain, with the cost of fuel and food set to rise. The Chancellor could have used today’s spring statement to scrap the fuel duty hike, which is due this September. Why didn’t she? Young people are angry and fed up. The next generation of young people could always expect that they would have a better life than the generation before, but that promise for today’s young people has been ripped away. Almost 1 million young people—the highest in more than 10 years—are now unemployed. We are facing a youth unemployment crisis. The Chancellor’s youth guarantee is simply a sticking plaster for the damage that has been done by the jobs tax. The Chancellor could have used today’s spring statement to reverse the jobs tax changes that have undermined job opportunities for young people and part-time workers. Why didn’t she? Graduates are being ripped off. They have studied hard—[Interruption.] Graduates are being ripped off—[Interruption.] They have studied hard, they have done everything they were told to do, but they are facing eye-watering repayment costs and they are struggling to get on in life. On this issue, it is a plague on all our houses—partisan point scoring does no favours to those young people. We have set out what we would do. The Chancellor could have used today’s spring statement to end the repayment threshold freeze, putting £100 back in graduates’ pockets in the first year, rising to £210 in the third. Why didn’t she? With great instability and conflict around the world and a move away from the rules-based system to great power politics, we must look urgently at building our national energy, defence and food security. In so doing, we can and must turn the necessity of building national resilience into strategic opportunities for economic growth. We welcome the fact that the Government have done a deal for helicopters with Leonardo, as a result of the calls from these Liberal Democrat Benches, especially hon. Friends from the south-west, who have raised this issue week in, week out. The Chancellor could have used today’s spring statement to launch a new defence bonds programme as part of a plan to spend 3% of GDP on defence by 2030. Why didn’t she? Finally, I will come full circle. I said that the country has paid the price for two anti-growth Labour budgets. The OBR today is clear: the downgrade in growth in 2026 is bigger than the upgrade in the next two years combined. We have to stop the cycle of short-term Treasury tax grabs over long-term growth. Our United Kingdom is an amazing country and has enormous potential, but we cannot take that for granted. We must accept that we are stuck in a rut, in a doom loop of low economic growth, and that is a big problem. I urge the Chancellor to take the measures that I have outlined to protect our country, to get Britain growing again and to end the cost of living crisis.