Finance Bill

I am grateful to the right hon. Lady for her kind words. Obviously, it will be up to the Exchequer Secretary to ask the question that I have already asked on this issue. The fact that all political parties were clearly under a degree of political pressure before the general election has been exposed by Lord Mandelson in his diaries, which were published in the last couple of days. We must acknowledge that any rise in VAT is the result of a really tough choice—a last resort, perhaps. One message to come out of this debate must surely be that when political leaders say they will not rule something out, particularly in the lead-up to a general election, the possibility of the measure being brought in after the election is usually rather higher than many members of the public might imagine. On this issue, Labour Members must be struggling to swallow, with all that butter not melting in their mouths.