Debate on the Address

We recognise that there is a constitutional anomaly, and that it must be dealt with properly and carefully, and in the context of finance. We are the only party, as far as I am aware, that wants to open up the issue of the Barnett formula and to reconsider whether resources can be better distributed on the basis of need. We note that the Government have flunked the issue of legislation on party funding. We believe, as do the public, that there must be limits on the amounts of money spent on party politics by political parties between and within election periods. There must be a cap on individual donations, whether from rich individuals or from trade unions, and that must be dealt with on an even-handed basis. There are other areas in which we have common ground with the Government. We welcome the principle behind the Climate Change Bill. We believe that it could be greatly strengthened by introducing annual targets, and the fact that the Government have recently been backsliding on targets for renewables reinforces the need for that policy to be firmly anchored in legislation. We are more concerned about the planning Bill, which has the potential to transfer a great deal of power from elected representatives to an unelected quango. Of course, the purpose behind it is to drive through new nuclear power and airport developments—very little to do with planning—and it threatens to undermine completely the checks and balances that have held the planning system together for many years. It is the same centralising instincts that seem to lie behind the new education Bill—this rather naive belief that we can fundamentally change the behaviour of grown people through compulsion. We are heading now for an absurd situation in which large numbers of adults are clamouring for more education and more retraining, but cannot get it because their local colleges are having their funding taken away, while at the same time the Government are trying to force young people into courses at local colleges that they do not want to attend and are completely unsuited to their circumstances. The Government's reputation—and particularly the Prime Minister's reputation—ultimately hinges on what happens to the economy. The Prime Minister is quite right that we have had a decade of stable growth. However, as I have warned over several years, that growth is seriously unbalanced by growing private debt linked to an inflated bubble in the housing market. Not just me, but many other people are starting to warn of the dangers. The International Monetary Fund is so warning, as is the chief economist of the Bank of England. Last week, we saw alarming evidence of the rapid rise of repossessions, which is what happens when we have a combination of excessive debt and a slowdown in the economy. The Government are providing new legislation on the specific issue of deposit protection—the aftermath of the Northern Rock affair. That is a reaction to what happened, but what we now need is some forward thinking about the new threats to the economy. When the Prime Minister first came in as Chancellor, he introduced some visionary legislation—the Bank of England Bill. It served this country very well; I gave my maiden speech in support of it. But the world is now a very different place and we need mechanisms to deal with inflation and deflation in the housing market and to deal with the looming problem of large numbers of people who cannot maintain their mortgages, facing the risk of losing their homes. We need mechanisms to ensure that the Chancellor's homilies about responsible and old-fashioned lending are translated into practice. We are not going to get this while the Government simply hang on, waiting for good news. We need vision, new ideas and fresh thinking, which are totally absent from this Queen's Speech. That is why we shall oppose it.