Sir Roger Gale
Member of Parliament for Herne Bay and Sandwich (including West Thanet)
 

Let`s start at the end of the month with the Hallowe`en `Nightmare Budget`.

The first Labour Government `Fiscal Event` (as we must now call them)  for fourteen years and also the first to be presented by a woman Chancellor of the Exchequer,  Rachel Reeves, had been so widely  trailed that we should, I suppose, have been prepared for the worst. Indeed, the pitch had been rolled so hard that there was precious little of any novelty left to announce and Mr. Speaker Hoyle was moved to deprecate once again the extent of government-by-media leak and expectation-management. What once would have been a matter for automatic resignation had a Chancellor exhaled so much of a breath of the contents of the Little Red Box in advance of the Budget Statement to the House has now metamorphosed to the point that it is almost not worthwhile being in the Chamber to hear the wretched news from the Mare`s Mouth.

Nevertheless it took Ms. Chancellor Reeves well over an hour to wade through her litany of criticisms of her predecessor, Jeremy Hunt and the “£22 Billion black hole” that she has sought to claim, without the endorsement of the Office for Budget Responsibility, was bequeathed to her by the previous administration. This astronomical phenomenon was, she says, so completely unexpected that it justified her Party`s breach of all of the pre-election undertakings given not to raise taxes. Although in the light of the eye-wateringly inflation-busting public-sector pay increases and largesse doled out to `hard-up` train drivers and junior doctors it is not hard to see how this “£22 billion black hole” has been transformed into a £40-billion plus spending spree that our grandchildren will be paying for, probably, until they have grandchildren of their own.

Those of an uncertain age may dimly recall a dapper Mr. (as he then was) Noel Coward singing “There are bad times just around the corner”.  That might well have been Ms. Reeves` theme music. We knew last month, of course, of Ms. Reeves` determination to deprive millions of pensioners of their modest Winter Fuel Allowance and to leave them shivering with the terrifying choice between  whether to `heat or eat`. That was one of the measures that she announced almost while having to door to the Treasury held open for her for the first time.

We also had plenty of advance warning that VAT relief for those providing  private education would be abolished. No matter that many small  schools will have to close as their clients, having scrimped and saved to do the best by their offspring, reach breaking point and have to opt for a public sector schooling that is already short of accommodation and staff. No matter that thousands of children with all manner of special needs and disabilities, at present catered for by the private sector because the public sector cannot provide for them, are likely to find themselves having to be educated at home while their parents have to give up employment and fall back on state support in order to make ends meet. No matter that this act of doctrinaire educational  vandalism will take years to repair if indeed it can be repaired at all. This is a new Labour Government with a huge majority (although only about a third of the popular vote ) and its leaders must throw political red meat to those on its left if they are to survive for another four months, never mind another four years.

A `cast iron` undertaking from Starmer`s government might just as well be made of plasticene for all that it is worth. Remember the pledge that `we have no plans to increase national insurance`? The budget revealed that employers national insurance contributions are to be increased. Another broken promise that will impact upon every business undertaking in the land and that will hit small and marginal businesses the hardest. The costs will have to be passed on to customers and in many cases that  will mean laying off or not replacing staff. Stimulating growth? I do not think so.

And then, of course, there is inheritance tax.  The `soak the rich` policies of envy look set to destroy very many family businesses and in particular of course rural enterprises such as wedding venues, family estates and farms that are earning a marginal living but that have, until now, been handed down over generations.

You do not, as a farmer, have to own very much in order to hit the one or even two million pound inheritance tax threshold. A modest old farmhouse, a few barns or outbuildings, a brace  of tractors and other farm machinery and a couple of hundred acres of land will put you into a bracket where, when you pop your clogs through old age or sheer exhaustion, your family will be hit for 20% of what you own.  As a result I know of farms and estates  that, even as I write, are cancelling investment plans because there is no point in increasing the value of your business if, instead of handing it on to your sons and daughters, you are simply going to lose more in inheritance tax. And pretty soon, in twenty per cent bite sized chunks, those family farms will no longer be viable and will be sold off for development.

As I told the House of Commons,  where I hail from they used to say that you should `live as if you`re going to die tomorrow and farm as if you`re going to live forever`.  Under Starmer`s metropolitan regime there will be no` forever` and few crops grown in what was once the Garden of England.  And that places the whole future of sustainability at stake.

This has been a high-borrowing high-spending old fashioned socialist budget. It is `back to the future` with spite and a vengeance.

Elsewhere in the corridors of what used to represent power the remnants of the parliamentary Conservative party has, having sent four prospective new Leadership candidates off to the Party conference to set out their stalls, whittled that number to three (exit Tom Tugendhat) and then to  two (exit, surprisingly for some, James Cleverly) before submitting  the remaining two, Kemi Badenoch and Robert Jenrick, to the membership for a postal vote by secret ballot to select the next Leader of the Conservative Party and of His Majesty`s Loyal Opposition.  Unless you have just arrived from another planet you will by now know that Kemi Badenoch has emerged from this parade as the victor and the fourth woman to become a challenger for the premiership of the United Kingdom.  The former Prime Minister and more recently leader of the Opposition, Rishi Sunak, has, having not walked away after defeat but rather having held the line with courage and great dignity, now taken his final bow on the front benches. I wish  Kemi well in the daunting task that faces her and Rishi good fortune  in whatever exciting challenges the future now holds for him.

The Government has introduced, and I have chaired through its committee stages, the Great British Energy Bill that may or may not be Great or British or produce Energy. It has also re-introduced a re-hashed version of the last government`s Renters Rights Bill which I also had a hand in piloting through committee, and the Employment Rights Bill, which looks set fair to add still further to the burdens facing business, deter growth and halt recruitment, has been published.  Measures to terminate the tenure of Hereditary Peers, that body of members that does so much of the hard graft in the House of Lords, have been debated  and a Private Member`s Bill to permit `Assisted Dying` (which I shall oppose) is to be introduced by my Labour friend Kim Leadbeater and is already delivering  vast quantities of computer -generated emails, both for and against, in addition to some original and heartrending accounts of personal experiences.

In Kent Admiral Sir George Zambellas, former First Sea Lord, has been installed as the Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports to succeed the late and much-loved Admiral Sir Michael Boyce.

The Lord Warden , appointed personally by the monarch, was historically one of the most important offices in the land and the post dates back over a thousand years. The inauguration ceremony, held this month at the Duke of York`s Music School headquarters in Dover, is attended by the representatives of the Original five (cinque,  pronounced `sink`) Head Ports and members of the Federation and is quaint and endearing.  To the misanthrope who said that it is ` all pomp and pageantry – the solution (not) to our problems` I can only say that our traditions and our heritage are worth many billions of pounds to our tourist and hospitality industries annually. A fact that those who wish to abolish our hereditary peerage and all that it stands for might care to ponder.

And finally Mr Johnson, fleetingly a Conservative Prime Minister and architect with Lord Frost of the deeply-flawed Withdrawal (from the European Union) Agreement has published his memoir under the tittle (sic) `Unleashed`. I shall deny myself the luxury of buying it  but I am told that he regrets having apologised to the public for partying in Downing Street  during the pandemic lockdown.  There is no indication, apparently, as to whether he also regrets apologising to Her Majesty the late Queen for the same crass error of judgement.