argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Long-term Economic Plan — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Education
Christopher Michael Leslie (Labour, Centre-left): Was it always part of the Chancellor’s long-term plan to scrap the maintenance grants for students from lower-income backgrounds? The Institute for Fiscal Studies said this morning that this change "will raise debt for the poorest students, but do little to improve Government finances in the long run." Can the Chancellor tell us why this was not in his manifesto?
Long-term Economic Plan — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Education
Christopher Michael Leslie (Labour, Centre-left): Well, that fell a bit flat. I was asking about the Chancellor’s manifesto and what he promised. Taking away maintenance grants was always part of his plan, but he did not have the guts to tell students and their families before an election. However much he spins it, he is hitting students with more fees, more repayments and more debt—much more debt. Will he confirm that the poorest students will graduate not with the current £40,000 of debt, but now with an average of £53,000 of debt?
Government Support: Savers/Homeowners — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Social Welfare
Barbara Mary Keeley (Labour, Centre-left): Why are the Government abandoning people with savings and those who own their own homes? They are going to be forced to spend their savings and sell their homes to pay for their social care costs. The Chancellor raised the hopes of those older and vulnerable people before the election with a pledge that no one would have to sell their home to pay for care. Those people will feel badly let down by the Government’s U-turn. Did he ever intend to keep that manifesto pledge?
Tax Credits — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Labor
Questions: What estimate he has made of the number of people who will receive a net reduction in income as a result of the policies on tax credits announced in the summer Budget 2015.
Teresa Pearce (Labour, Centre-left): Many large, profit-making employers currently pay low wages and enjoy a state subsidy of their staff costs via the tax credit system. What ideas and options did the Treasury team consider for clawing back that subsidy from the employers before it decided to take it from the low paid?
Tax Credits — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Macroeconomics
Questions: What estimate he has made of the number of people who will receive a net reduction in income as a result of the policies on tax credits announced in the summer Budget 2015.
Shabana Mahmood (Labour, Centre-left): Research from the House of Commons Library shows that the effect of the Chancellor’s decision to increase the tax credit taper from 41% to 48% is that workers earning above the income tax personal allowance threshold will face a marginal effective tax rate of 73% in 2015-16, which increases to a staggering 80% in 2016-17. How does the Minister reconcile the Chancellor’s rhetoric about standing up for workers with the reality of a marginal effective tax rate of 80%, which is a hefty work penalty by any measure?
Tax Credits — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Macroeconomics
Questions: What estimate he has made of the number of people who will receive a net reduction in income as a result of the policies on tax credits announced in the summer Budget 2015.
Shabana Mahmood (Labour, Centre-left): High tax rates are normally loathed by Conservative Members, but obviously not when they affect ordinary working people. The Chancellor has been busy trying to suggest that his national living wage will compensate for this work penalty, but he knows that the real living wage is calculated on the basis of a full take-up of tax credits—the very thing he has now cut. Is it not the case that, regardless of the rhetoric, all that this Budget has delivered for ordinary working people in our country is a hefty work penalty and a living wage con?
Employment Support Allowance — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Labor
Questions: What discussions he has had with the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions on the effect of proposed changes to employment support allowance on levels of employment.
Dawn Petula Butler (Labour, Centre-left): Of course we all want to see work pay, but a large section of the community are sometimes unable to work for short periods of time because of illnesses such as sickle cell disease. The Minister seems to have overlooked that group of people.
Deficit Reduction — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Macroeconomics
Luciana Clare Goldsmith (Berger) (Labour, Centre-left): I note that the hon. Member for Richmond (Yorks) (Rishi Sunak) is a new Member. Perhaps he might have forgotten that before 2015, the Chancellor said that he would eradicate the deficit by this election. May I ask the Minister to confirm that due to the recent fiscal changes in his July Budget, the OBR forecast that an additional £26.8 billion would be borrowed by the public sector between 2016 and 2017, and is it not the case that the Government have missed every single one of their deficit reduction targets?
Revenue — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Macroeconomics
Questions: What estimate he has made of the net change in revenue to the public purse that will arise from tax changes announced in the summer Budget 2015.
Stephen James McCabe (Labour, Centre-left): Ernst and Young points out that the rise in household taxes is reducing disposable income, with £47.2 billion of tax rises, including the insurance premium tax and vehicle excise duty. Does the Minister accept that over the course of this Parliament, these tax rises are twice as big as any tax cuts?
Employment Trends — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Macroeconomics
Andrew John Gwynne (Labour, Centre-left): The Minister will know that the OBR analysis shows that the number of high-skill jobs in the UK economy is shrinking at a time when the number of low-skill jobs is increasing. Is he proud of that record?
Export Target — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Foreign Trade
Geraint Richard Davies (Labour, Centre-left): Britain needs export growth, not just cuts, to clear the deficit, but the Chancellor is set to miss his export target by a massive £350 billion and to deliver the worst peacetime trade deficit since 1830. What action are the Government taking to combine the creative industries with our manufacturing base to target emerging middle classes in BRIC countries—in particular, China and India—to fire up growth and not rely solely on hitting the poor with cuts?
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Social Welfare
Questions: I welcome the Chancellor’s recent announcement on Sunday trading hours. What steps can he take to ensure that neighbouring authorities take a joined-up approach, so that consumers have confidence in the consistency of Sunday trading hours and we provide the maximum possible benefit to our economy?; The Treasury loses out on hundreds of millions of pounds each year by allowing high-earning hedge fund managers to pay capital gains tax at 28%, rather than income tax of 45%, on carried interest payments. Does the Chancellor agree that we should close that loophole so that we can invest the money in properly paid apprenticeships and tackling child poverty?; I am delighted that in the Budget an allocation of £7.2 billion was made for transport infrastructure in the south-west. Will the Chancellor kindly confirm that that allocation includes funding for the much needed upgrade of the A358, the Henlade bypass and junction 25 of the M5, all of which will pave the way for a new strategic employment site?; How can the Chancellor justify making people who go out to work worse off while he spends £1 billion on cutting inheritance tax for people who are already wealthy? That is not rewarding hard working; it is rewarding the fortunate few.; The Chancellor’s announcement on the living wage was widely welcomed, but what assurances can he give to residential care homes that offer subsidised places, of which there are many in Worthing, which will suffer from the proposed changes but will not benefit on the other side from the record reductions in corporation tax?
Virendra Kumar Sharma (Labour, Centre-left): The Institute for Fiscal Studies pointed out last week that although the number of workless households in poverty has fallen, that fall has been matched by a rise in the number of working households in poverty. Will the Chancellor acknowledge the scale of in-work poverty, and does he accept that cutting tax credits for working families and repealing the child poverty legislation will make the situation worse, not better?
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Macroeconomics
Questions: I welcome the Chancellor’s recent announcement on Sunday trading hours. What steps can he take to ensure that neighbouring authorities take a joined-up approach, so that consumers have confidence in the consistency of Sunday trading hours and we provide the maximum possible benefit to our economy?; The Treasury loses out on hundreds of millions of pounds each year by allowing high-earning hedge fund managers to pay capital gains tax at 28%, rather than income tax of 45%, on carried interest payments. Does the Chancellor agree that we should close that loophole so that we can invest the money in properly paid apprenticeships and tackling child poverty?; I am delighted that in the Budget an allocation of £7.2 billion was made for transport infrastructure in the south-west. Will the Chancellor kindly confirm that that allocation includes funding for the much needed upgrade of the A358, the Henlade bypass and junction 25 of the M5, all of which will pave the way for a new strategic employment site?; How can the Chancellor justify making people who go out to work worse off while he spends £1 billion on cutting inheritance tax for people who are already wealthy? That is not rewarding hard working; it is rewarding the fortunate few.; The Chancellor’s announcement on the living wage was widely welcomed, but what assurances can he give to residential care homes that offer subsidised places, of which there are many in Worthing, which will suffer from the proposed changes but will not benefit on the other side from the record reductions in corporation tax?; The announcement that the free childcare available for working parents of three and four-year-olds will double to 30 hours a week in 2017 is excellent news for families across Pendle. Does not the fact that we are delivering that commitment demonstrate that only by taking tough decisions can we afford to provide the high-quality services that hard-working families deserve?
Paula Michelle Sherriff (Labour, Centre-left): This Chancellor has missed every one of his own deficit reduction targets, and borrowed more than any other Chancellor in history. Will he confirm that, according to the Office for Budget Responsibility forecast, the fiscal changes in the summer Budget mean £26.8 billion more public borrowing in the next two financial years, and that since 2010 he will have borrowed a full £200 billion more than he planned?
Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Social Welfare
Questions: I welcome the Chancellor’s recent announcement on Sunday trading hours. What steps can he take to ensure that neighbouring authorities take a joined-up approach, so that consumers have confidence in the consistency of Sunday trading hours and we provide the maximum possible benefit to our economy?; The Treasury loses out on hundreds of millions of pounds each year by allowing high-earning hedge fund managers to pay capital gains tax at 28%, rather than income tax of 45%, on carried interest payments. Does the Chancellor agree that we should close that loophole so that we can invest the money in properly paid apprenticeships and tackling child poverty?; I am delighted that in the Budget an allocation of £7.2 billion was made for transport infrastructure in the south-west. Will the Chancellor kindly confirm that that allocation includes funding for the much needed upgrade of the A358, the Henlade bypass and junction 25 of the M5, all of which will pave the way for a new strategic employment site?; How can the Chancellor justify making people who go out to work worse off while he spends £1 billion on cutting inheritance tax for people who are already wealthy? That is not rewarding hard working; it is rewarding the fortunate few.; The Chancellor’s announcement on the living wage was widely welcomed, but what assurances can he give to residential care homes that offer subsidised places, of which there are many in Worthing, which will suffer from the proposed changes but will not benefit on the other side from the record reductions in corporation tax?; The announcement that the free childcare available for working parents of three and four-year-olds will double to 30 hours a week in 2017 is excellent news for families across Pendle. Does not the fact that we are delivering that commitment demonstrate that only by taking tough decisions can we afford to provide the high-quality services that hard-working families deserve?
Emma Louise Lewell-Buck (Labour, Centre-left): I listened to the Minister and Chancellor talking about tax credits earlier, but here is a bit of reality. A couple in my constituency told me that as carers for a disabled child, they work part time and will lose around £2,000 in tax credits under the Chancellor’s reforms. But they will not benefit from a higher minimum wage because their jobs are professional level and their hourly pay is already above that rate. Does the Chancellor think it is fair that his reforms will make families with disabled children poorer?
DWP Data — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Labor
Deborah Angela Elspeth Marie Abrahams (Labour, Centre-left): (Urgent Question): To ask the Prime Minister to make a statement on his commitment of 24 June to publish Department for Work and Pensions data on the number of people in receipt of employment and support allowance and incapacity benefit who have died since November 2011, including those found fit for work.
DWP Data — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Government Operations
Gerald Bernard Kaufman (Labour, Centre-left): I wish my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham East and Saddleworth (Debbie Abrahams) every good fortune in awaiting a reply to a letter to the Prime Minister, in view of the fact that in the last five years I have had exactly one letter from him, and that was after I had received a letter from No. 10 signed by somebody who did not exist I say to the junior Minister that she needs to take some lessons from her boss in dealing with questions in this House, because whatever the nature of his replies, he replies with courtesy. She needs to learn about that as well. Let me put it to the junior Minister that yesterday the Government broke a pledge about providing information and conducting consultation, and today we have a further example of the Government breaking a pledge. Will she explain whether this is simply arrogance or incompetence?
DWP Data — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Government Operations
George Edward Howarth (Labour, Centre-left): Does not the Minister accept that although of course each case is a personal and individual tragedy, we aggregate and analyse data to see whether a pattern emerges? Does she accept that as long as she drags her feet on this issue, people will conclude that the Government may have something to hide?
DWP Data — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Social Welfare
John Martin McDonnell (Labour, Centre-left): Just over a year ago, 130,000 people signed a petition and there was a debate in the House calling for a cumulative impact assessment by the Government of the welfare changes on people with disabilities. These data are just one element of that. The House decided without opposition that the Government should undertake that exercise. Are they giving any consideration to conducting a cumulative impact assessment?
DWP Data — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Government Operations
Robert Howard Marris (Labour, Centre-left): I entirely agree that one should not make assumptions and that the last Government had a better record on transparency of statistics than some previous Governments, albeit the Office for National Statistics repeatedly criticised Ministers in the last Government for misusing statistics. The Minister accuses Opposition Members of scare- mongering and hand-wringing, but how can she know—I do not—unless she already has the statistics?
DWP Data — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Government Operations
Marie Elizabeth Rimmer (Labour, Centre-left): Will the Minister tell us whether the Government are appealing against the decision on publishing the data, what costs have been incurred and why the Secretary of State did not make the House of Commons aware of the appeal in the first instance, instead of stating that the figures were not being collated?
DWP Data — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Labor
Jonathan Neil Reynolds (Labour, Centre-left): Each month the Department for Work and Pensions publishes vast amounts of information on employment figures, wages and benefits. It has always done so, and, by the way, Ministers never seem to be shy about placing their own interpretation on those data. Should it really be so difficult for them to tell us whether people are alive or dead?
Points of Order — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Law and Crime
Luciana Clare Goldsmith (Berger) (Labour, Centre-left): On a point of order, Mr Speaker. You will have seen that the Home Office has sneaked out a written statement on the last day of term about a short consultation on the funding arrangements for the 43 police forces in England and Wales. There is much concern in areas such as Merseyside—which has already lost 23% of its budget and over 700 police officers—about what this will mean for the years to come. Have you, Mr Speaker, received any indication from the Government that a Minister is intending to come to the House and give an oral statement on this important issue?
Finance Bill — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Macroeconomics
Shabana Mahmood (Labour, Centre-left): I am grateful to the Minister for his comments on the measures set out in the Bill. It is a somewhat strange Finance Bill, because many of the most contentious measures announced in the Chancellor’s emergency Budget are not actually in it. Indeed, the Bill is almost as significant for what is not in it as for what is. It is important to reflect on that, and on the fact that the Budget exposed a real difference between the Chancellor’s rhetoric and the reality of what he is delivering, particularly for ordinary working people in our country It was certainly not the Budget, and this is certainly not the Finance Bill, that working people needed. The Institute for Fiscal Studies has told us that 3 million working families will be around £1,000 a year worse off. The Budget clearly leaves working people worse off. Despite what the Minister has said about productivity, as a package it fails the test of building a more productive economy to bring down the deficit in a more sustainable, stronger and fairer way The Bill does not provide for the contentious changes to tax credits, which the Minister and I have debated several times already over the past week or two, or the reduction in the work allowance and the increase in the taper rate, which will hit working people on middle and lower incomes. We discussed those changes during Treasury questions this morning, particularly the high marginal tax rates that people who earn just above the personal allowance threshold and are currently in receipt of tax credits will be facing. I understand that those changes will be made by delegated legislation, which we expect later this year. They will be hotly debated and opposed, because choosing to make 3 million working families £1,000 a year worse off is the wrong choice, regardless of how the Government try to dress it up The Bill also does not set out the changes to the minimum wage. Despite what the Minister and the Chancellor have been saying over the past week or so, what the Government have announced is not a real living wage.
Finance Bill — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Labor
Andrew John Gwynne (Labour, Centre-left): My hon. Friend makes an important point. Just because the Chancellor calls an increase in the national minimum wage—welcome though that is—a national living wage does not make it "the" living wage. Is she as concerned as I am that the IFS has said that it is arithmetically impossible for the increase in the national minimum wage to match the losses that will result from the changes to tax credits?
Finance Bill — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Macroeconomics
Shabana Mahmood (Labour, Centre-left): My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The Government have been busily trying to claim that the changes to tax credits will result in no real change because the new national living wage, which is effectively only an increase in the national minimum wage, will make up for that. The IFS has made it clear that that is arithmetically impossible. That is a pretty damning indictment of the messages that the Government have been trying to put out since the Budget on 8 July.
Finance Bill — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Labor
Shabana Mahmood (Labour, Centre-left): It is quality that counts, rather than quantity, and Labour Members will show their true quality, as opposed to those sitting to my left—literally to my left, that is—on the SNP Benches. We will of course support the measures that will bring in what is effectively the new national minimum wage, but it is important to expose the fact that it is not, in fact, a living wage. The living wage is calculated on the assumption that there will be full take-up of tax credits, which is exactly what the Chancellor has cut. Given the cut to tax credits, the real living wage will be significantly higher than anything the Chancellor has set out. The effect of his decision is that in 2016 he will be offering the people of this country the 2011 living wage. That is an important point to get on the record. That is why the IFS has said that compensating ordinary working people for the loss of their tax credits with the changes on wages is arithmetically impossible.
Finance Bill — House of Commons, 2015-07-21
Topic: Macroeconomics
Shabana Mahmood (Labour, Centre-left): The hon. Gentleman makes a really important point. Taken alongside the changes to student maintenance grants and other measures, the Budget will leave young people, particularly those from poorer backgrounds, worse off. It will have a real impact on their life chances. As those measures are brought forward, it is important that we keep holding the Government’s feet to the fire on the impact they are having on young people Changes to the national minimum wage are normally made by statutory instrument, but given the change in the name—the Chancellor’s rebadging exercise—they might need to be done by primary legislation. I would be grateful if the Minister explained how the Government will go about making those changes. If primary legislation is needed, I am rather surprised that the changes are not set out in the Bill. It would be good to have the Government’s further comments on that The Bill contains nothing more on productivity, notwithstanding the Minister’s comments in his opening speech. Solving the productivity puzzle is absolutely imperative if we are to experience much stronger economic growth and get the deficit down more fairly. The Conservatives’ record on productivity is one of failure, given the difference between productivity in our country and in our competitors’ economies. I am afraid that the Budget simply offered more of the same Despite the Chancellor’s boasts, the Office for Budget Responsibility has revised productivity down next year, the year after, the year after that, and the year after that. His belated productivity plan was simply a patchwork of existing schemes, rather than a substantial reform to boost skills, business growth and wages. The Bill should also have included legislation on big infrastructure decisions, which the Government appear to have ducked.