Cost of Living Increases — House of Commons, 2022-01-24
Topic: Macroeconomics
Ian Murray (Labour, Centre-left): May I say how pleased I am that we are having this incredibly important debate today? While Parliament has been hopelessly paralysed by the Prime Minister’s refusal to do the decent thing and resign, I hope that the debate allows us an opportunity to discuss the human reality of this Government’s cost of living crisis Up and down this country, people are facing the anxiety that comes from worrying about whether they can pay their bills and heat their homes. Having to decide whether to eat or heat is an awful indictment of Britain in the 2020s. If that decision has to be made by one person, that is one person too many, but, under this Government, millions of people are having to make that decision. Moreover, there is total inaction; there is nothing to say. There is also nothing in this light parliamentary timetable to help. The Minister himself, in the near 20 minutes that he spoke, gave nothing to help families in this country in the cost of living crisis. The Government could have tabled an amendment to the motion—I am sure that the hon. Member for Glasgow East (David Linden) would have allowed it—for us all to vote for and back to help the people of this country with the cost of living crisis, but we have radio silence. Because of that inaction, more and more face hardship and worry Inflation stands at more than 5%, a 30-year high. Energy bills are to rise by 40%—on average by £700 per household—shortly. The average UK worker is still not any better off than they were when this Government took power more than a decade ago. The Chancellor is planning the largest tax hike in living memory, taking the tax burden on working people to its highest since 1950. What a record that is: a high-tax, high-inflation, low-growth Tory party. This weekend, we were led to believe that the entire Cabinet would get behind stopping the planned national insurance tax rise, but what did we hear today? We heard the Chancellor turning against his own national insurance hike by calling it the "Prime Minister’s tax". That is a whole new definition—the Chancellor of tax-dodging. Nobody in the country is buying it. The Government should bring the question back to this House if they want to vote the national insurance rise down The human cost of the situation is stark. In the past year, Citizens Advice Scotland has seen a 38% increase in the number of people coming to it for advice about being unable to pay their mortgage. The figure is much higher for those unable to pay their rent. Polling conducted on behalf of the same organisation found half a million Scots cutting back on their food spending in order to pay their energy bills this winter—before those huge rises. What is worse is that official statistics on inflation do not capture the full extent of the difficulty facing families, especially those on low incomes. The food blogger, Jack Monroe, who rose to fame with recipes showing how to cook family meals for less than £10 a week, highlighted that on social media over the weekend. They gave examples of the cost of the cheapest pasta in the local supermarket rising by 141% in the past year, the cost of the cheapest bag of rice rising 344% and the cost of baked beans rising 45% year on year. At the same time, those on the lowest incomes have seen universal credit cut and their budgets tightened even further To make matters worse, as the hon. Member for Glasgow East mentioned, the costs of filling up the car have risen to their highest level ever and, while they rise like a rocket, they fall like a feather, needlessly costing families much more. Then we have Brexit infiltrating the supply chains, making it much more difficult to get food into the country, increasing costs in our supermarkets. That is the reality not of a global market, but of this Government’s decision making. Families are working every hour under the sun but are still unable to make ends meet, and the position is getting worse, not better.