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Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation

That is the point that I am making: there are savings to be made. The TUC report states:""Tax relief is heavily skewed towards the better off. Treasury figures reveal that 60 per cent. of tax relief goes to higher rate taxpayers, including nearly £10 billion a year…to the top 1 per cent. of earners, those on more than £150,000 a year."" On those skewed subsidies, the TUC also said that the Government could""raise £10 billion a year by capping the amount of tax relief that can be claimed by those earning more than £100,000 a year at £5,000"." Indeed, the TUC's analysis shows that""just 3.1 per cent. of the taxpayer population receive 31 per cent. of all tax relief, averaging £18,750 a year"." It compared that with people earning just below £100,000—between £70,000 and £100,000. They receive on average £4,500 in tax allowances, so it would not be unreasonable to cap tax relief at £5,000 for people earning more than £100,000. As I have said, it could save the taxpayer £10 billion a year. I see no reason why we should not do that well ahead of public service cuts, which would hammer the poorest people in our community. We can make other savings, too. First, next year we will spend another £5 billion on the war. I do not think that that is worth it; the British people do not want it. I pay tribute to the soldiers, who are tremendously brave—indeed, some have lost their lives, and that is a great tragedy for their relatives and friends—but it is a futile war for all sorts of reasons. We should not be engaged in it; we should have been discussing with the moderate Taliban how they can govern their country with the existing Government. Given our current situation, we cannot afford to spend £5 billion a year on that war. We have to settle it, and any future Government must settle it immediately. Secondly, there are the costs of nuclear weapons. I agree with the Liberals about Trident, but they are mealy-mouthed, because they keep using the phrase "like for like". They are not really about scrapping nuclear weapons and making those savings. In fact, if they got into government—I suspect that this applies to the Tories as well—they would abandon the Trident replacement and put nuclear weapons on aeroplanes instead. That would be incredibly dangerous for the world situation, and it would not save that much money either. Then there is the issue of expanding nuclear power. That is an immensely expensive road to go down, and our Government are encouraging it all around the world as well. Only this week, there was a headline in The Daily Telegraph about the risk to this country from a dirty bomb. I do not think that that has been properly taken into account in the argument about nuclear power. In any case, the nuclear industry cannot be expanded without massive public subsidies. That is not appropriate in our financial situation, notwithstanding the fact that we have an energy crisis, which is best dealt with by expanding the renewables sector, as well as making important energy savings. We also need to look more closely at the oil industry, which has made huge profits and benefited from a deal at the beginning of each Parliament. When oil and petrol prices went up, the industry made huge profits that were not handed back to the British taxpayer. A future Government will have to return to the issue of privatisation and private finance initiative contracts. We are paying in excess of what they are worth: London Underground is a great example of that. In future—in the health sector, for example— we will increasingly be paying large amounts in exchange for nothing at all. That is wrong, and it needs to be revisited by Government. Those are some suggestions on cutting the deficit that should come ahead of public spending cuts. My hon. Friend the Member for Luton, North is right: there is still a great need to spend Government money to do things out there. I draw attention to just one of those areas—child poverty. We have made a commitment—indeed, we have passed an Act—that says that we want to abolish child poverty by 2020, but that will not happen unless the Government back up their commitment with further spending. This Government have done a great job with Sure Start and the child tax credit. Those things would be at risk under the Conservatives. Indeed, we know that if the Conservatives got into a coalition with the Liberals, the child trust fund would also be at risk, because the hon. Member for North Southwark and Bermondsey (Simon Hughes) made it clear that that is Liberal policy. Those things are vital to help young people to have a future and get out of poverty. The Government need to do more about the level of benefits, including jobseeker's allowance. The TUC says:""Increasing JSA by as little as £10 a week would make a real difference to millions of families."" That would help to bring people at that level out of poverty. The other big factor in tackling tackle child poverty is equal pay—that could make a huge difference. We have closed the gap, but far too slowly. A future Labour Government must do more on equal pay. As an employer themselves, they should be driving down the road of equal pay and forcing employers to do so. Whatever the issues in the election, in future Parliament will have to return to the issue of equality. We do not want a party, such as the Conservative party, to be elected as a Government who would actually laud inequality and enhance it further.