Vol. 810 Friday No. 202 12 March 2021 PARLIAMENTARYDEBATES (HANSARD) HOUSE OF LORDS OFFICIAL REPORT ORDEROFBUSINESS Supply and Appropriation (Anticipation and Adjustments) (No. 2) Bill Second Reading(and remaining stages).........................................................................1903 Budget Statement Motion to Take Note.....................................................................................................1903 Contingencies Fund (No. 2) Bill Second Reading (and remaining stages) .......................................................................1983 Lords wishing to be supplied with these Daily Reports should give notice to this effect to the Printed Paper Office. No proofs of Daily Reports are provided. Corrections for the bound volume which Lords wish to suggest to the report of their speeches should be clearly indicated in a copy of the Daily Report, which, with the column numbers concerned shown on the front cover, should be sent to the Editor of Debates, House of Lords, within 14 days of the date of the Daily Report. This issue of the Official Report is also available on the Internet at https://hansard.parliament.uk/lords/2021-03-12 In Hybrid sittings, [V] after a Member’s name indicates that they contributed by video call. The following abbreviations are used to show a Member’s party affiliation: Abbreviation Party/Group CB Cross Bench Con Conservative DUP Democratic Unionist Party GP Green Party Ind Lab Independent Labour Ind LD Independent Liberal Democrat Ind SD Independent Social Democrat Ind UU Independent Ulster Unionist Lab Labour Lab Co-op Labour and Co-operative Party LD Liberal Democrat LD Ind Liberal Democrat Independent Non-afl Non-affiliated PC Plaid Cymru UKIP UK Independence Party UUP Ulster Unionist Party No party affiliation is given for Members serving the House in a formal capacity, the Lords spiritual, Members on leave of absence or Members who are otherwise disqualified from sitting in the House. © Parliamentary Copyright House of Lords 2021, this publication may be reproduced under the terms of the Open Parliament licence, which is published at www.parliament.uk/site-information/copyright/. 1903 Arrangement of Business [12 MARCH 2021] Budget Statement 1904 House of Lords account measures from the spring Budget last year, the figure rises to £407 billion. The OBR now expects Friday 12 March 2021 the UK economy to recover to its pre-crisis level six months earlier than originally expected—in the second The House met in a hybrid proceeding. rather than the fourth quarter of 2022. Importantly, the Budget extends the furlough scheme 11 am until the end of September. Support for the self-employed Prayers—read by the Lord Bishop of Southwark. will also continue until September, with an additional 600,000 people now potentially eligible to claim. The Arrangement of Business universal credit uplift of £20 a week will be maintained Announcement for a further six months and working tax credit claimants will receive equivalent support over the same timeframe. 11.05 am Among other things, the Budget also reaffirmed the The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Garden of Frognal) Government’s commitment to increase the national (LD): The Hybrid Sitting of the House will now begin. living wage to £8.91 an hour from April. It also Some Members are here in the Chamber, others are announced a new restart grant in April to help businesses participating remotely, but all will be treated equally. I to reopen and get going again, as well as a new ask all Members to respect social distancing and, if recovery loan scheme to replace our earlier bounce-back the capacity of the Chamber is exceeded, I will immediately loans and coronavirus business interruption loans. adjourn the House. I see that some noble Lords are The Chancellor was also open about the longer-term standing—the custom is that, when the Lord Speaker fiscal challenge that we now face. The Budget does not or Deputy Speaker is standing, no one else is. raise the rates of income tax, national insurance or VAT. Instead, it maintains personal tax thresholds on Supply and Appropriation (Anticipation incometax,inheritancetax,thepensionslifetimeallowance and Adjustments) (No. 2) Bill and the annual exempt amount in capital gains tax, Second Reading (and remaining stages) with higher earners affected the most. It also announced an increase in corporation tax to 25% from 2023. 11.05 am Importantly, 25% is still the lowest corporation tax Bill read a second time. Committee negatived. Standing rate in the G7 and companies that make less than Order 44 having been dispensed with, the Bill was read a £50,000 profit annually will only be subject to a 19% tax third time and passed. rate. Given that the Government are providing businesses with over £100 billion of support to get through the current crisis, it is only right to ask them to contribute Arrangement of Business to our recovery. Announcement The third component of the Budget is a series of 11.07 am initiatives and measures to support the investment-led The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Garden of Frognal) recovery that the country needs. A new super deduction (LD): The time limit for this debate is five hours. I will, in some cases, allow companies to reduce their remind Back-Bench speakers that they have two minutes taxable profits by 130% of the cost of the investment to speak; time is very tight, so please do not exceed that they make in plants and machinery, which is your time. equivalent to a 25p tax cut for every pound that they invest. Worth £25 billion over the two years that it is in Budget Statement place, the super deduction represents the biggest business Motion to Take Note tax cut in modern British history. The Budget also announced, among other things, 11.07 am the creation of the first ever UK infrastructure bank, Moved by Lord Agnew of Oulton headquartered in Leeds. Two new schemes—Help to That this House takes note of the economy in Grow and Help to Grow: Digital—will help tens of light of the Budget statement. thousands of small and medium-sized businesses to get world-class management training and help them The Minister of State, Cabinet Office and the Treasury to develop their digital skills. We are helping to ensure (Lord Agnew of Oulton) (Con): My Lords, the Budget that we have access to the talent that we need through that the Chancellor set out last week has three key the reforms that we are making to our visa system. elements. First, it protects jobs and livelihoods and Achieving an investment-led recovery means allowing provides additional support to get the British people investment to flow more freely, which is why we want and businesses through the pandemic. Secondly, it is to give the pensions industry more flexibility to unlock clear and honest about the need to fix the public billions of pounds from pension funds into innovative finances. Thirdly, it starts the work of building our new ventures.Alongside these measures, our commitment future economy, including by providing opportunities to levelling up across the United Kingdom is reflected to level up across the country. in the £4.8 billion levelling-up fund; accelerated city The Budget announced additional measures worth and growth deals in places such as Ayrshire, Falkirk, £65 billion to support the economy through the pandemic north Wales and Swansea Bay; more than a £1 billion this year and next. Added to last November’s spending for 45 new towns deals; and a £150 million fund to review, the number is £352 billion and, taking into help communities across the United Kingdom take 1905 Budget Statement [LORDS] Budget Statement 1906 [LORD AGNEW OF OULTON] Is the Chancellor right to suggest that fiscal resilience ownership of pubs, theatres, shops or local sports clubs should be his principal objective, or is his obsession at risk of loss. This complements the inward investment distorting the Government’sentire approach to economic that will be attracted through the announcement of policy? Let us be clear: the prime objective of government eight new freeports in eight English regions. economic policy should be the management of demand The country has experienced the worst fall in GDP for the nation’s real resources, labour and productive in three centuries—not the 1976 sterling crisis, not the capacity. The Government should set fiscal policy to Second World War, not the First World War, not the ensure the very best use of resources today and Napoleonic War; this has been harder financially than development of resources for the future. If this involves all those. In response, the Chancellor has presented a more debt, then that is the best economic decision; if it plan that will continue to protect jobs and livelihoods involves more taxation, then that is the best decision. and to support British people and businesses through The role of taxation is not to pay off the debt but to be this moment of crisis. It will begin to fix the public part of a balanced programme of fiscal and monetary finances and will start the work of building our future policy to stimulate the real output needed for the economy through investment-led recovery. achievement of the Government’sgoals: health, education, defence of the realm, decent living standards, tackling climate change and so on. The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Of course, the mixture of taxation, spending and Garden of Frognal) (LD): My Lords, I should have debt decrease or increase may have other consequences added that the maiden speakers all have an extra that must be taken into account. For example, the minute and the welcomers an extra 30 seconds. I call OBR demonstrates that quantitative easing has lowered the noble Lord, Lord Eatwell. the maturity of UK debt, making it more interest rate-sensitive.