Opposition Day — Further Public Spending Cuts — 28 Jan 2015 at 15:53

The majority of MPs voted in favour of further public spending cuts.

The motion rejected in this vote was:

• That this House
• notes comments from leading doctors and nurses that the NHS is in crisis under this Government, which has wasted £3 billion on a reckless reorganisation;
• believes an extra £2.5 billion a year should be invested in the health service, including to fund an additional 20,000 nurses and 8,000 GPs, by raising additional revenue from closing tax loopholes, a levy on tobacco companies and a tax on properties worth over £2 million;
• further notes that the Office for Budget Responsibility has said that the Government’s spending plans in the Autumn Statement would return public spending to a share of national income last seen in the late 1930s, before there was an NHS, and a level which is incompatible with the Government’s claims to be able to protect the NHS;
• recognises that only four OECD countries have total government expenditure at 35 per cent or less of GDP and that all of these countries have significantly higher charging as a share of overall national health spending than in the UK; and
• calls on the Government to reconsider the plans set out in the Autumn Statement for even deeper spending cuts, which the head of the Institute for Fiscal Studies has said could involve a fundamental reimagining of the role of the state.

Debate in Parliament | Source |