Laura Trott MP: speeches

Speeches

• 4 Nov 2024 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  There has been a lot of discussion about our record in government. Under the Conservatives, England climbed international educational league tables, but what happened to Labour- run Wales? It fell. Under the Conservatives, youth unemployment went down and school standards improved —that is the record of the Conservative Government, which we are proud to defend. Does the Secretary of State agree that academisation was one of the driving forces behind that very good school improvement?

• 4 Nov 2024 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  The problem that we have is that while we are learning the lessons of our defeat, the Government are failing to learn from our brilliant record on school standards. Results improved, more schools were “good” or “outstanding”, but now the party in government is trying to undermine one part of the basis for that success. Why is the Secretary of State scrapping the academy conversion support grant when it was such a push behind improving school standards?

• 29 Oct 2024 · Taxes on Working People · Hansard source

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  During the election campaign, I held a press conference at which I outlined the glaring funding gaps in Labour’s plans and the taxes they might raise to pay for them. One of those taxes was employer national insurance contributions. The right hon. Member for Bristol North West (Darren Jones)—now Chief Secretary to the Treasury—responded at the time by arguing that this was a list of things that “Labour isn’t doing.” Is it correct that raising employer national insurance contributions is something Labour isn’t doing?

• 29 Oct 2024 · Ministerial Code: Policy Announcements · Hansard source

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  The response from No. 10 yesterday, and Labour’s whole argument, seems to be, “We did it because you guys did it.” But I am old enough to remember a fresh-faced Prime Minister coming into Downing Street and promising change. Labour justifying its actions based on things that the Conservatives have done does not seem like the change we were promised, does it? We are learning the lessons of why we lost the election, but this Government seem to be taking lessons from the worst bits of our record. And not just ours—from the last Labour Government, too. It is like the greatest hits of Government mistakes being replayed in just 100 days. Cronyism? Is it Blair? No, it is the fresh-faced Labour Government giving civil service jobs to donors. A gross betrayal of pensioners? Is it Brown? No, it is the new Chancellor deciding that those on £13,000 are rich and do not need their winter fuel payments. Rampant politicisation of our institutions? Was this not something Labour accused Boris Johnson of? No, it is the Chancellor again, who said this weekend that the ex-Prime Minister and ex-Chancellor will have to answer to the Office for Budget Responsibility, despite the OBR saying that the report has nothing to do with previous Ministers and led The Times to argue that the OBR has been reduced “to the provisional wing of the Treasury press office.” Disrespectful statements emanating from No.10 about your decisions, Mr Speaker? Not the Conservative party, but the No. 10 press office, just yesterday. And potentially breaching the ministerial code with abandon about Budget leaks? Right again, it is this Government. This Government’s false piety has been breached comprehensively by the Downing Street passes scandal and crony appointments to the civil service, and their hypocrisy has been laid bare for all to see. Yet still they bleat on about the Tories like some broken spell they mutter over and over again in an attempt to conjure up the old magic, but it is not going to work. Labour is so obsessed with playing political games that its Members find themselves going over the Budget, simultaneously claiming that the Conservatives spent too much, but also spent too little. It is nonsense. The question that I want to ask the Government today is who is going to take responsibility for the Budget leaks? What assessment have the Government made of whether this is a breach of the ministerial code?

• 29 Oct 2024 · Ministerial Code: Policy Announcements · Hansard source

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  (Urgent Question): To ask the Prime Minister if he will make a statement on whether Ministers disclosing policies to the media before the Budget are in contravention of the ministerial code’s statement that the most important announcements of Government policy should be made, in the first instance, in Parliament.

• 3 Sept 2024 · Cost of Living: Support for Pensioners · Hansard source

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  Ten years ago, the now Chancellor argued in this House that winter fuel payments should be means-tested and cut for “the richest pensioners”. The Chancellor’s 10-year campaign has now come to fruition and she has proposed removing the winter fuel payment from pensioners on just £13,000 a year. Does she still think that a pensioner on £13,000 a year is rich?