---

Living Standards

The hon. Member for Poole (Mr Syms) almost had me agreeing with some of his speech, certainly in its early moments, but I am afraid that he blew it at the end when he talked about the Chancellor being sensible and then praised the Liberal Democrats—neither of the main parties in this House should stoop to such a level. We have heard the phrase, ““We're all in this together””, many times over the past 18 months. I wonder how the 11,600 families in my constituency who will see their tax credits cut by an average of £680 per annum—on top of the three-year child benefit freeze and all the other cuts that they have seen—will feel about our all being in this together. I think they will be sitting there thinking that we are certainly not all in it together. Around the country, 100,000 more children will be in poverty as a result of this Government's plans, proposals and policies. Will they think that we are all in it together? I somehow do not think they will. The number of young people in my constituency who are aged between 18 and 24 and have been claiming jobseeker's allowance for six months or more has increased by 154%. That is a huge increase in the number of young people who find themselves in the position of not having any work. They will not think that we are all in this together, and rightly so, because we are not. The Minister sneered a few times when the issue of bankers came up. The Government are keen, with their coalition pals, to talk about how hard they have been on the bankers with their levy. They always seem to forget that they offset the hit of the levy with the corporation tax cut and other giveaways to the bankers. The bankers are not sitting there saying ““We've been really hard hit by this; we're all in this together””—of course they are not. They are quite happy because on the face of it, they have had this big levy, but the reality is that that is diminished by the corporation tax changes and other benefits. The pay of FTSE 100 directors has risen by 49% but my constituents can only dream of a 4.9% increase in income. Are we all in this together? I do not think that we are. A pattern is developing. The wealthiest, the bankers and the FTSE 100 all seem to do nicely as against the children and the poorest. The three poorest deciles are being hit three times as hard as the top decile.