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Value Added Tax

I am delighted that the hon. Gentleman has given me the opportunity to set the record straight on the Floor of the House. The Chancellor has made it clear repeatedly that he considered, as any Chancellor would, a large number of options about every aspect of tax and spending, as the House would expect. I ask the hon. Gentleman to look at the incorrect impact assessment that appeared on the website, because if he were to do so, he would see that I had not, in fact, signed that document. The Leader of the Opposition said that I had signed it, but my name had been typed in a sort of italic, slightly floral typeface under the following phrase:"““Signed by the responsible Minister”” ." I cannot see how anyone could have mistaken that for my signature, and I am pleased to have had the chance to put that on the record. My right hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Mr. Field) rightly drew attention to today's unemployment figures, because they underline just how vital these measures are and how vital a stimulus now is. If the Conservatives, when in government, had introduced a fiscal stimulus of similar scale at the same point in the previous economic downturn, it would have saved some 300,000 jobs—but they did not. They did nothing; they let the recession run its course, as some of them are arguing should happen again now. The nation remembers the enduring damage that was the result: businesses needlessly destroyed, jobs unnecessarily lost and people remaining workless today as a direct consequence of the failings then.