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Finance Bill

Clearly, rising food and fuel prices will trouble the economy, and the Government must look at those matters and deal with them as they can. Making changes to last year's Budget this year might not be the appropriate way forward. Instead, the appropriate way forward might be that suggested by my right hon. Friend the Member for West Dunbartonshire and the Treasury, which is to see how we might accommodate the changes being forced upon us by exterior events. The hon. Member for Taunton asked about the vision thing. There have been answers from the Labour Benches on the national health service and climate change, but the vision is also present in the Budget and the Budget statements. It is a value vision based on opportunity, fairness, efficiency and equilibrium between all strands of society. We are frequently coming across that vision. A reference was made to this being a managerial Budget. It was not managerial, but it was intended to accommodate a difficult financial situation and to be a steady-as-she-goes Budget—the words of Stanley Baldwin many years ago. There are difficulties, therefore, but within them there are also opportunities, and this Budget reflects those opportunities, as do the Labour Government. Our business is to maintain stability in our society in what is an unstable world, and this Budget does that. The measures announced today by the Bank of England, supported by the Chancellor, will assist that stability, and as time goes by we will see that the British public will come to understand that and will support us.