§ 10. Mr. Jon Owen JonesTo ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what estimate he has made of the impact of the average family's tax bill of all the increases in taxation announced in his Budget last month.
§ The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Stephen Dorrell)On average, the main tax-related changes proposed in my right hon. and learned Friend's Budget will cost households around 90p a week from April 1994 and an additional £1.80 a week from April 1995.
§ Mr. JonesIs the Minister aware that, during the election campaign, my constituency was covered with posters announcing the so-called "Labour tax bombshell"? Since then, there has been a Tory tax explosion. Will the Minister explain why his party lied during the election about its tax proposals?
§ Mr. DorrellWe saw earlier this afternoon the exact nature of that Labour tax bombshell. The hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne, East (Mr. Brown) stood at the Dispatch Box and called for increased public expenditure without giving the House any indication of how he intended that expenditure to be paid for. We will listen to the Labour party on the subject of lower tax when it tells us how it would finance its spending programmes.