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The Budget

I appreciate the comments and agree with the sentiments expressed. To turn to the Budget, it was an incredible achievement in very difficult circumstances. Some Opposition Members should be slightly less churlish about the fact that a fiscally neutral Budget resulted in an extra £65 million being made available to the Welsh Assembly. Clearly, we would all like more money to become available to Wales, but in the circumstances, a fiscally neutral Budget that has resulted in an extra £65 million for Wales must be welcomed. What I very much appreciate about the Budget is the fact that it targets the real need of the economy of the United Kingdom and Wales—the need for a private sector-led renaissance. We have seen measures on bureaucracy and tax that will be welcomed by small businesses throughout my constituency and, I suspect, the whole of north Wales. We are over-dependent on the public sector in Wales. That is not to show a lack of appreciation for the people who work in the public sector. We all appreciate the fact that people work in hospitals, schools and so on, and a huge contribution is being made by people working in the public sector. However, we cannot carry on with a situation in which the Welsh economy derives some 70% of its added value from the public sector. We cannot carry on with a situation in which the Welsh economy is more dependent on state spending than East Germany was in 1989, because that is simply unacceptable in 2011. The only way to tackle the situation is to encourage businesses to grow. I stated this morning that I welcomed the fact that we were reducing corporation tax. We want to make the United Kingdom a competitive place for large businesses to come and invest. In the same way, I welcome the fact that small company corporation tax is being reduced from 21% to 20%, but I would like that to go further.