Olly Glover

For all the positives in this Budget, the real disappointment is that it does not match the radicalism and the claims of the now endless Government social media and TikTok barrage. It is extraordinary, given everything that he said when he was Secretary of State for Defence, that the Chancellor has kicked the big defence spending decisions down the road. There are warm words, but there is no plan for helping people back into work—and, of course, nothing concrete on Europe, something that even the previous Chancellor acknowledged over the weekend needs to be addressed. A big theme for my constituents is the need for infrastructure to support housing. I believe that there would be less despair and opposition to new houses if central Government listened to calls for transparency and ambition when it comes to infrastructure and public services to support housing growth. Setting and publishing targets for the amount of primary healthcare, transport, large-scale leisure or policing per head of population, based on an analysis of local demographic needs, and showing progress or otherwise against those metrics, would help to restore trust and would highlight where investment is needed. That is all the more important as local councils do not have direct control of most of these areas. The lack of acknowledgment of such challenges, let alone action on them, in the Budget is disappointing. It is also regrettable that there are no rolling funds or investment programmes for major transport improvements. Without them, no hope has been created for a new railway station serving Grove and Wantage, accessibility improvements to Cholsey station, or electrification from Didcot to Oxford. We have to hope that the Government’s slow embrace of devolution, amid the utter shambles of local government reorganisation, will fill this void, but that very much remains to be seen given the number of unanswered questions. There are some welcome measures to support hospitality, but small producer relief for small-scale producers of alcohol still excludes vineyards such as Hendred vineyard, which produces a few thousand bottles a year. That makes little sense: the alcohol intensity of a drink does not inherently correlate with how much it is abused, and English wine has a promising future. Let me end by referring to what the Budget says about science and high tech. Despite some positive measures on AI safety and capital gains tax founders’ relief, the Government’s previous decisions on science mean that this is the biggest area of disappointment. My constituency contains a wide range of science and technology organisations, and the Government’s decision to cut Science and Technology Facilities Council funding significantly is incomprehensible and unforgivable. No wonder that after three months the Government have still not had the basis courtesy to reply to my letters about that. The 15% funding cuts in Harwell’s three national and globally significant research facilities—Diamond Light Source, the ISIS Neutron and Muon Source and the Central Laser Facility—will lead to significant decreases in operating time, of up to 25%. I am used to the Government ignoring me, but perhaps they will listen to the deputy general secretary of Prospect, Sue Ferns, the Liverpool city region mayor, Steve Rotherham, and the physicist Brian Cox, all of whom have warned that the cuts would “cause lasting and possibly irreparable damage to the UK’s scientific capabilities”.