Speeches by Baldwin.

“In her statement, the Home Secretary mentioned that the National Crime Agency had disrupted 347 immigration crime networks. Can she tell us how many gangs were smashed during the same period?”

“As the Foreign Secretary follows the diplomatic path, will he ensure that in the discussions of the two-state solution, it is borne in mind that not only does the state of Palestine exist, but that Israel’s neighbours do need to recognise Israel’s right to exist?”

“I declare an interest, as a trustee of the parliamentary contributory pension fund.. Many people in the public sector receive a significant pension contribution, but they are not aware of its value. The Pension Schemes Bill currently going through Parliament presents an opportunity to place on someone’s pay cheque and …”

“Further to the previous question, people the beautiful constituency of West Worcestershire look back in anger at some of the decisions made by Labour during its first year in office—not least the decision in the Budget to bring in a tax on my local children’s hospice, Acorns, which has added £400,000 to its bills. Will…”

“Well, except for the fact that the whole House will have heard that the Government are not prepared to rule out saddling cycle manufacturers and other businesses with more taxes this autumn. Will the Minister at the very least assure the House that he and his fellow Business Ministers are making representations to the …”

“It is not just cycle manufacturers that are having to pedal hard to survive under this Government. With business survey after business survey stating that tax is the biggest worry for business, will the Minister take this opportunity to assure businesses that the Chancellor will not be coming back to burden them with m…”

“I thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield (Sir Andrew Mitchell) for securing this urgent question on the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. I welcome the leadership steps that the UK Government are taking, but will the Minister tell the House what conversations are being had with both the African Uni…”

“The Economic Secretary may want to have a look at Hansard and make sure she got the right soundbite on the record about the 10 months of wage growth and the comparison. My understanding is that wage growth was indeed slow after the financial crash. We tried to compensate for that by increasing personal allowances, but …”

“What year is that, just for my understanding?”

“Clearly, a Chancellor will have to do something about that.”

“What year is that?”

“But all other things being equal, if the Chancellor does not make a decision in this year’s fiscal event, fuel duty will go up 5p next spring.”

“Yes, and when will the inflection point be where it has such a major impact on the number of petrol cars on the road that Chancellors are going to have to step in and do something?”

“Another place where we will suddenly start losing revenue is fuel duty. In your current numbers and projection, when does the temporary 5p reduction in fuel duty end?”

“What you scored for—anecdotally—the inheritance tax changes, which seem to be having the biggest impact in terms of people’s location decisions, was 0.1 every year, in terms of the net figure. So it is not a huge revenue inbound, but you do not have any way that you can pull the emergency cord and warn the Treasury abo…”

“What I am hearing you say is that they could all have left by the time you get the actual numbers.”

“From HMRC?”

“When I read your fiscal risks and sustainability report this time, I immediately thought of that Hemingway quote about how you go bankrupt: in two ways—gradually, then suddenly. I thought that the report looked like we had entered the “suddenly” phase. I wanted to ask you about one of the things that you scored in your…”

“My hon. Friend is making a powerful speech. Does she agree that, as a result of that Bill, one of the things that is most shocking is that in due course it will actually pay someone more to be on welfare than to work full time on the minimum wage?”

“I thank the Minister for advance sight of his statement. The Post Office really is the Heineken of Government services: it reaches parts of the UK that other arms of government do not. The Post Office is much more than a business; it is a vital part of the UK’s social and economic fabric. It connects communities, suppo…”