Lord Fox (LD)

My Lords, it is a great pleasure to speak in this debate and to welcome the noble Lord, Lord Booth-Smith, to his place and the noble Baroness, Lady Penn, back to her place. The noble Lord, Lord Johnson, is taking his new job as party co-chairman very seriously. Clearly, to entertain his troops, he has turned up the rhetoric to 11. However, for all the huff and puff we have just heard, His Majesty’s loyal Opposition have no moral authority to criticise those who are picking up the mess they left. The parlous state of the economy, the near collapse of public services and the sheer level of financial mismanagement that we saw from the former Government was a disgrace. One of the benefits of your Lordships getting to debate this Budget somewhat after it was released is that its effect is starting to crystalise, and I suspect that the Minister may be disappointed by the way it has been received. Then again, as he is a seasoned Treasury hand, I would ask him whether he was surprised by the reception the Budget got. OBR data and that of countless other analysts shows that UK households, which are still struggling to absorb the shocks from the pandemic, inflation and the energy crisis, will now be hit by the tax increases in this Budget, one way or another. Meanwhile CPI inflation is expected to rise above previous expectations and interest rate cuts will probably slow. So it cannot really be a surprise that the Chancellor failed to inspire a mood of national cheer. Nevertheless, we are glad that the Chancellor listened to Liberal Democrat calls for more investment in the NHS in order to start repairing the damage done by the Conservatives. We will now hold the Government to account on delivering their promises, so that people can, for example, see a GP or dentist when they need to. However, we must ensure that this money is not used to paper over the cracks. Structural reform is needed, but more than that, the Government are still ignoring the elephant in the room: the social care crisis. In fact, it is likely that they are making the situation worse, because the employer national insurance increase will hit social and primary care. Thousands of private care providers are now facing increased costs, forcing them to reduce services and increase charges or even pushing them into collapse. GPs, who are already stretched, will also be hit by this tax change. GPs and social care providers cannot afford these tax rises and you cannot fix the NHS without fixing primary and social care. We urge the Government immediately to sort out the challenges facing these health providers. They must also start cross-party talks on the long-term future of social care and get on with reforming it. Having boxed themselves in during the election from using big tax opportunities, the Chancellor could have done what we campaigned for: reverse Tory tax cuts in the bank tax, implement an increased tax on betting companies and levy the digital giants. Instead, the Chancellor turned to business to raise a spectacular amount of tax. As a result, the UK tax take is set to rise to a historic high. This was a tough Budget for employers to swallow, particularly small and medium businesses, social enterprises and charities. SMEs have had a tough time for years, struggling with rising energy prices, Covid loans, high interest rates and rocketing input costs. They were hammered by the previous Conservative Government, who broke their promise to reform business rates and tangled them up in red tape. Given their importance to our economy, it is wrong to hit them like this. The burden of this Budget should fall on the likes of big banks, social media giants, gambling companies and oil and gas firms—not small businesses. Added to increased NIC costs, the living wage increases will have a big effect. Leaders in the hospitality and retail sectors told the Business Secretary that the tax bill for employing a part-time worker had increased by 73% as a result of lowering the threshold for national insurance contributions. This sort of rise cannot be absorbed in these low-margin sectors. Then there are the changes in agricultural and business property relief. Your Lordships will likely hear today—and already have—how these changes threaten the generational chain of family farm ownership. I add my voice to that. As someone from Herefordshire, I know the effect this is already having on rural communities. Less publicised is the possible plight facing family businesses. Will the Minister say how these businesses will be valued when they are taxed? How does the introduction of this liability encourage family firm entrepreneurs to grow their business? I note that these changes raise little more than £500 million overall. Given the individual anguish they are already causing in our communities and the political trouble they are causing him, I wonder whether the Minister would rather have increased the betting tax instead. With all this, the Chancellor looked to sweeten the pill. The Minister set out those measures very well. The message is that, in return for the pain, there will be progress: an industrial strategy, infrastructure investment, including accelerating the drive to net zero, and investment in people and skills. These Benches say “bravo” to that, and I congratulate the Chancellor on continuing the industrial strategy put in place by Vince Cable on and investing in key sectors. Capital-intensive sectors have also welcomed the commitment to long-term political stability, be it through the corporation tax road map or the full expensing regime, but what new ideas can we expect? On infrastructure and net zero, it is all about delivery. The startling thing about the Chancellor’s projections is the very low level of growth over the next five years: 2% or less is not a good return on the investment the Government say they will make. It should also be noted that this Budget is very front end-loaded. The money going into public services in years four and five dwindles spectacularly. The Government are hoping that actual growth will increase beyond current projections to bail out those last two years. That requires delivery. We want this Budget to succeed. The list that the Minister just rattled off was full of important things that this country needs, but we have no time to waste. We will be strong on chasing delivery. I for one worry whether the UK has the capacity to absorb investment on the scale the Government intend, not least because they are moving slowly on the skills sector. The Minister mentioned Skills England, but when will any results of that start to affect how investment is delivered? Where is the workforce going to come from to deliver the growth we need, and how will investment be delivered? We await the Government’s 10-year infrastructure strategy. What will the vision be for infrastructure investment? How will projects be prioritised? Can the Minister please clarify how the new national infrastructure and service transformation authority will improve delivery, and when will we see all of this? Of course, there is a golden opportunity to boost growth. If the Government are serious about growth, they have to materially fix our relationship with the EU. That means beginning the work that will set us forward towards future membership of the single market. In summary, burdening small businesses, GPs and small care providers with a jobs tax is wrong. Small businesses have had a very tough time for years and countless small care providers are on the brink. Making things even harder for their workers is not right. Family farms have experienced one shock after another in recent years, from spiralling energy, fertiliser and feed prices to the Conservatives’ terrible trade deals. This Government should not have dealt them another blow, especially when they are making real-terms cuts to the Defra budget. We will be standing up for family farms. We are also calling on the Government to exempt social care providers and GPs from the employers’ national insurance tax rise, and we will continue to speak up for those struggling with the cost of living crisis, holding the Government to account on their decisions to cut the winter fuel payment and to increase bus fares. I look forward to hearing from your Lordships in the debate.