National Insurance Contributions Bill

Not at all. If the right hon. Gentleman allows me to develop my points, he will understand them in a more rounded way—he may still disagree with them and we may not achieve consensus, but he will understand them. Most hon. Members would regard it as unreasonable to hang a man for shoplifting a bar of confectionary, although that is a moral decision and I accept that the result might not be unanimous in this House. I sense that there are differing views in this House about what is a reasonable level of taxation and whether a tax is reasonable at all. For example, I think that a windfall tax on the profits of oil companies, which have made the market and considerably increased the price of oil in the past few months, would be reasonable, but I suspect that many Opposition Members would not think so.