Covid-19: Economy Update — House of Commons, 2020-10-22
Topic: Labor
Anneliese Jane Dodds (Labour, Centre-left): For months, we have urged the Chancellor to get ahead of the looming unemployment crisis and act to save jobs. Instead we have had a patchwork of poor ideas rushed out at the last minute: a bonus scheme that will pay £2.6 billion to businesses that do not need it; a job support scheme that simply was not going to work for the majority of businesses under pressure and that we said at the beginning did not do enough to incentivise employers to keep staff on; and an approach to support for areas entering tier 3 that has been nothing short of shambolic This has had real consequences. The deadline for large-scale redundancies came and went before the Chancellor announced the job support scheme, the deadline for small business redundancies passed before he realised that he needed to amend it, and many parts of our country have spent months under tier 2 restrictions without adequate support. How many jobs have been lost because of that inaction? Over a million have already gone. In the last quarter, we saw a record rise in redundancies. The Chancellor could have done much more if he had acted sooner Now we see yet another last-minute move. Let me ask the Chancellor. What has changed that means that this is the right thing to do now but it was not when parts of the north and midlands entered tier 2 many weeks ago? Does he agree with his own Mayor for the west midlands who said that "this particular point was just one that was completely missed" Completely missed was the need for support for tier 2 areas. The Chancellor has only caught up and listened to the anxiety of workers and businesses when it looks like these restrictions will be affecting London and the west midlands. Will he apologise to those who have already lost their jobs and seen their businesses slip through their fingers in those areas that have not had that support until now The Chancellor referred to £1 billion of generous up-front grants for businesses and jobs provided in a "fair and transparent way". There has not been a system of up-front grants for those in the north and midlands, and the process has not been fair and transparent for businesses and workers. To be honest, it is nothing short of insulting to describe what we have seen over the past few weeks as fair and transparent. The Government still have not published the formula that has been used for business support in tier 3 areas, and they still seem addicted to the approach where they say they are in negotiations with different areas but the reality is something completely different. When will he come clean about that support and the formula that is being used Will the Chancellor also make good on his Government’s claim that the JSS extension will be topped up to at least 80% for workers facing hardship? I know this is difficult for the Government. I see that the Prime Minister is sitting next to the Chancellor; he thought it would be topped up for everyone to 93%. I think that is what he said. Clearly the Government are not very sure on this, so maybe I can spell it out for them. That support does not amount to 80% for huge numbers of workers facing hardship—for example, those who have modest savings or who are excluded for other reasons, as so many are—and they have to wait five weeks anyway before they get that help. That could be fixed speedily by the Government, but they are refusing to do so. Does the Chancellor also recognise that those fixes for social security must apply to the self-employed, for whom an increase to just 40% of their previous income will not stave off hardship—and that is not to mention those who have been excluded throughout This is becoming like a long-running television show: the winter economy plan, series 3. But the twist is that it did not last the winter, it did not do enough to help the economy and it was not a plan. We have to get ahead of this crisis instead of always running to keep up. That is why Labour has called for a national circuit breaker to give us a chance to reset and to fix the broken test, trace and isolate system, but time is running out to implement that circuit breaker so that it includes half term and maximises the opportunity it brings. Will the Chancellor change course?