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Mr. Touhig: The Queen's Speech and pre-Budget report tell a good story for pensioners, students, children, parents, jobseekers and workers in Wales. It is a story rooted in our Labour values of fairness, opportunity and social justice.
In this interesting and wide-ranging debate we have heard about the tough choices that the Government have had to make. The Queen's Speech set out a modern and progressive agenda, and the pre-Budget report provides Wales with an extra £38 million to help us to continue developing our public services. With those commitments, we aim to meet our productivity challenge, increase employment opportunities and build a fairer society.
This is a record legislative programme for Wales, with two Wales-only Bills and, as my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State announced this morning, a draft Bill to come on an older people's commissioner for Wales. The people of Wales deserve opportunity and security at home, which, as today's debate shows, Labour is committed to providing. The Opposition parties may whinge and moan, but it is the Labour Government who have cut crime, increased funding for the police by 19 per cent. in real terms, brought about a record number of police and community support officers, and given the police the powers that they have been asking for, which they need to do their job.
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While the Opposition parties get on their soapboxes, this Labour Government deliver for the people of Wales. When it comes to opportunity, with a Labour Government Wales is working: Welsh business activity levels grew for the 19th consecutive month in October; we had the second highest rise in earnings in the UK last year; 100,000 more people in Wales are in jobs than in 1997; and unemployment is at its lowest for 30 years. Jobseekers and workers have good news, with Labour's helping hand into work being extended as we strengthen the new deal and roll out the pathways to work programme.
The Government deliver for people of all ages—from a £65 increase for child tax credit, to increases of £4.25 for a single person's pension and £3.95 for a couple, and an extra £50 for pensioners over 70. Fighting poverty from childhood to old age is a record of which the Labour Government can be proud. While the Opposition parties talk Wales down, the Labour Government build it up with a strong economy, and security and opportunity for all.
The hon. Member for Montgomeryshire opened for the Opposition parties and welcomed the Bills on transport and the ombudsman, but soon lost the plot. He also seemed to lose his memory: he was concerned about council tax, and was particularly critical about rebanding, but that policy was agreed when his party were in partnership with the Labour party in Cardiff before the last Assembly election.
The hon. Gentleman complained about council tax, but was characteristically vague about how the Liberal Democrats' local income tax would work. In answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, Central (Mr. Jones), he described his system as simple, but after listening to his explanation, I think that the only thing that is simple is the person who devised the policy.
Lembit Öpik: I regret the fact that the Minister has to resort to personal attacks. Surely he will accept that the Liberal Democrats have made a serious proposition of an alternative method, which is different from the council tax, called local income tax. It works in other countries and is simpler than the council tax. Would he not at least accept that, although he may disagree with our proposal, it is for the voters to decide which they prefer?
Mr. Touhig: I never for one moment suggested that the hon. Gentleman was simple; I have too much regard for him to think that he had a hand in the daft policy that his party is putting forward. He failed to explain how the Inland Revenue, whose database for income tax is built around where people work, will adjust its IT system to cope with a local income tax based on residence. There are 500,000 people who are not covered by pay-as-you-earn and do not pay tax. One assumes that, if the Liberal Democrats had their way and we had a local income tax, they would also not pay that.
The hon. Gentleman then had the cheek to go on about the failure of Government IT systems. That comes from a party that, in Wales, is so IT illiterate it e-mailed its manifestos to Labour Members of the
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National Assembly and not to Liberal Democrat Members.
Mr. Roger Williams: The Minister is straying a little from local taxation. Would he not agree that the Inland Revenue knows where people live as well as where they work? We had a thoughtful contribution from one of his hon. Friends, who said that council tax had just about run its day. Will the Labour Government continue with their support for council tax, or will they look at fairer methods of raising local taxation?
Mr. Touhig: If the hon. Gentleman is patient, I will come to that in a moment. I have remarks to make about other contributions first.
The hon. Member for Montgomeryshire moved from one fantasy to another. He explained that his party wishes to abolish the Department of Trade and Industry, but that it does not want to abolish the spending. What is the point of abolishing the Department if it is going to leave the spending? I am sure that the 90,000 miners, miners' widows and families in Wales who have made claims under the mineworkers compensation scheme will wonder where their compensation will come from when the Liberal Democrats, if they get their way, abolish the DTI.
The hon. Gentleman ended up with the usual Lib Dem wish list of massive increases in public expenditure on everything from ending variable tuition fees to free care for the elderly, all probably uncosted but providing a convenient bandwagon for the Liberals to jump on to gain publicity without responsibility. If jumping on a bandwagon were a criminal offence, the Liberal party would be serial offenders and would be in deep trouble.
Mr. Roger Williams: We have always said that one cannot get good public services without public expenditure. For that reason, we supported the Government when they proposed increases in national insurance for employees and employers. We are now being honest in saying that any improvement in public expenditure that we propose will be paid for by increasing the marginal rate of taxation for those people who earn more than £100,000 of taxable income. We think that we are being fair, honest and transparent, but I do not believe that the Minister is reflecting that.
Mr. Touhig: The hon. Gentleman's figures do not stack up. That has been shown in the comments made by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State this morning and on other occasions. Most of the Liberal Democrats' programme appears to be uncosted. I have said about the Liberal Democrats time and again that it is a matter of publicity without responsibility. They will not be in government. Those of us who campaign with the Liberal Democrats in Wales all know that they are like the 50p piece—seven sides and two faces.
My hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, North welcomed Bills in the Queen's Speech, in particular the news that there will be a draft Bill for an older people's commissioner. She went on to mention jobs in the civil service in her constituency, and I can tell her that 84 jobs have moved into the constituency. As a result of changes that the Government have made in the past
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few years, 400 jobs have come to Swansea with the Pension Service, and 600 jobs will come to Newport with the transfer of the Office for National Statistics.
My hon. Friend has a reputation as a powerful campaigner for child care and the rights of the family. Because she is a respected authority on those matters, we paid particular attention today to her comments on the Government's child care plans. She made it clear that, in her view, the Government are making a real difference. She welcomed the 10 per cent. increase in the child care element of the tax credit, the child trust fund and the improved paternity and maternity rights for fathers and mothers. She said that in her constituency there is much hope and optimism for the future. I believe that she speaks for the overwhelming majority of her constituents and for the people of Wales. Whenever the general election comes, I have no doubt that that will be reflected in the result in Cardiff, North.
The hon. Member for Meirionnydd Nant Conwy welcomed the announcement made by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State on the older people's commissioner, and I thank him for that. However, he went on to complain that there was nothing in the Queen's Speech about the National Assembly for Wales' Housing (Suspension of the Right to Buy) (Wales) Bill. I reiterate that the Assembly proposal is to be considered in the Session 2005–06. I confirm that the Bills to come before Parliament in this Session are those priority Bills passed on to us by the First Minister, representing the Assembly.
The hon. Gentleman seemed to support the Liberal Democrats' proposals for a local income tax. In response to him and to the hon. Member for Brecon and Radnorshire, I can say that Sir Michael Lyons is conducting an inquiry into local government funding in England. I confirm that my colleague Sue Essex, the Assembly Minister for Finance, Local Government and Public Services, has been in touch with Sir Michael Lyons, as have I, because the outcome of his report will feed across into Wales. I believe that he will be taking evidence in Wales, which is important. The Government are committed to reflecting upon the way in which local government is funded, but we are not rushing headlong into a daft scheme of the sort proposed by the Liberal Democrats.
Lembit Öpik: Can the Minister confirm that if that report recommends a local income tax, the Government will consider it?
Mr. Touhig: We shall wait to see the outcome of the report. I would not want to anticipate it.
The hon. Member for Meirionnydd Nant Conwy also spoke about under-age drinking and alcohol abuse, and I share his concern. The drinks industry needs to do more to combat excessive drinking and to persuade more people to drink more moderately. I secured an Adjournment debate when I was a Back Bencher, following which I received a nasty letter from a leading executive of a drinks company. I had criticised the company because it was doing market research on alcohol-based milk shakes. Who drinks
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milk shakes? Children do, and that company was targeting children for its future business.
The hon. Gentleman went on to comment on the drugs problem that blights society throughout the United Kingdom. I share his view that we should have an extensive intervention programme, and I can tell him that my colleague the Assembly Minister for Social Justice and Regeneration is initiating a number of financial schemes in order that Wales can have a more extensive intervention system.
I would not attribute the following comments to the hon. Gentleman, but he might want to pass on the view to his colleagues in Cardiff. The Assembly's nationalist spokesperson on social affairs has called for the full decriminalisation of cannabis as a first step towards ending the long-lost war on drugs. Indeed, in an article in Triban Coch earlier this year, she called for cannabis cafés in Cardiff as a potential way of boosting the tourist trade there. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman does not share that view, but it would not be a bad idea if he were to let his colleagues in the Assembly know of it.
The hon. Gentleman went on in some detail to speak about the many Home Office Bills in the Queen's Speech. They are all important Bills in fighting crime and combating drug misuse, and there is the proposal for youth justice legislation, which he welcomed. However, like the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire, the hon. Gentleman complained a great deal about the Government's proposals for ID cards. In particular, he thought that it would be an infringement of civil rights to require people to carry an ID card. Surely, we would all agree that the greatest right is the right to life. All of us, as citizens, should expect the Government to take steps to protect us from crime and the threat of terrorism. People who have nothing to hide have nothing to fear from ID cards.
The hon. Gentleman went on to speak about experiences in other countries, where, he said, ethnic groups felt that they were being stopped unnecessarily by the police. We do not have ID cards in this country but there is plenty of evidence that that has happened here. I recognise that what the hon. Gentleman described can happen, but surely it is important that we tackle that as an abuse in the system, rather than saying that we would not consider ID cards because they involve problems when people are stopped.
We have ID cards to gain access to the Palace of Westminster, as I said to the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire this morning. Like, perhaps, many other right hon. and hon. Members, I have been stopped by the police and asked for my identity. Is not it simple just to show my card and show that I have the right of access? Imagine not having ID cards to come in here and being stopped by a police officer, impeding our right to come here as the House allows us to while investigations were carried out to prove who we are. The argument is weak. I hope that as the Bill passes through Parliament the hon. Gentleman will—although I am not too hopeful about him—reflect on the importance and value of the measure, and not take it to be such an infringement of civil rights as he now considers it to be.
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