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Finance Bill

May I remind the hon. Gentleman, who has only just come into the Chamber, that the cumulative debt has been built up not by the Scottish National party, the Conservative party, the Liberal party, the Social Democratic and Labour party, the Ulster Unionist party or the Democratic Unionist party? It has been built up, over a decade, almost exclusively by the British Labour party. I say to the hon. Gentleman with the greatest of respect that we are picking holes in the Finance Bill and finding the things that will not work, and it is for Ministers and for the Government to find solutions to the problems that they have created. [Hon. Members: ““Answer!””] There is absolutely no point in their making a meal of things, then expecting someone else to sweep up the rubbish. In regard to business, it is interesting that the Government have failed to listen—not to me or to the Tories but to the people on the outside. They have failed to listen to the British Chambers of Commerce on scrapping the plans to raise the small companies rate; they have not done that. They could also have looked again at the plans on capital gains tax, but they have not done so. The Finance Bill will take more money from business. Ministers will say that the baseline capital gains tax rate has been reduced, and that is absolutely correct. That will save business about £5.5 billion. However, almost every penny of that will be clawed back by the changes to general plant and machinery capital allowances. Indeed, this year and next year, the changes to those allowances will outstrip the benefit of the 2p reduction in the basic rate of corporation tax. Businesses will gain no net benefit by investing in their business or their people or, most importantly at this time, by absorbing the increases in the cost of fuel, energy, transportation and raw materials.