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Business of the House

What I have done today is to announce the business for this week and the provisional business for the week after the recess, and that is the normal way we do things. I do not confirm anything beyond what I say in the business statement. On the Budget debate, the right hon. Gentleman will have heard that this is a Budget that helps to secure the recovery, helps to invest in industry and new jobs, helps to protect front-line public services, and helps the many, not the few. He will not have seen in the Budget an announcement that there would be cuts in inheritance tax for the top 2,000 richest families; instead, he will have seen an increase in the minimum wage and a continued commitment to tax credits. We do not need any lessons from the Opposition about fairness. As for improving the services of HMRC, the Public Accounts Committee report came out today, and obviously we will reflect on that. On the question of the number of businesses that have been helped by being allowed to defer paying their taxes, giving them more time to pay, I will write to the right hon. Gentleman and place a copy of the letter in the Library. I thought that more than 200,000 businesses had been able to approach HMRC and ask to defer any of their taxes so that they could stay in business through the recession. Irrespective of the final figures—I will ensure that I give him an accurate version and place a copy in the Library—I would say very strongly that this has been part of the Government's help to small, medium-sized and larger businesses, all of which has resulted in revenue not going into the Treasury; that has been partly why the deficit and public borrowing have increased, which was necessary to sustain businesses through the recession. Whatever the figure is, whether it is 200,000 or 300,000, it represents businesses that have been saved and jobs that have not gone down the pan, and all those things would not have happened if the Opposition were in government, because they opposed these measures. On the Reform of the House of Commons Committee proposals, we have put on the Order Paper the Standing Orders that give effect to the resolutions of the House, and we will bring those forward for approval by the House on Monday. Those Standing Orders do no more, and no less, than what the House agreed to in its resolutions of 4 March, so they sit absolutely on all fours with those resolutions. Because the Standing Orders will give effect to resolutions that were agreed by the House after debates of some 10 hours—they simply put into effect the express will of the House—it is my expectation that they will be agreed without dissent. I hope that that will happen on Monday. As regards parliamentary questions, we expect all written parliamentary questions to be answered, and we are liaising with Departments about that. On the Personal Care at Home Bill, the right hon. Gentleman has drawn to the House's attention the fact that, yes, there is a motion on the Order Paper for the House to sit at 11.30 am on that day rather than at the normal time. We have a short recess this time. I have set out the business on the basis that we will be coming back on the Tuesday after bank holiday Monday, which is quite an early return.