George Eustice, Member of Parliament for Camborne, Redruth and Hayle has today welcomed measures announced by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rishi Sunak MP in the Winter Economy Plan as part of the next phase of our planned economic response to coronavirus, following the Prime Minister’s address to the nation.
Trying to get back to living our lives as a close as possible to normal while accepting that we will all be living alongside the cornonavirus for some time to come is a great frustration for everyone. It is frustrating for restaurants and other businesses trying to get back in the saddle, for children and young people trying to resume their education and local sports clubs, bands and choirs who have all seen their activities severely disrupted.
We have learnt quite a lot about the virus over the last nine months so this week the Prime Minister outlined a tightening of some of the measures now in order to avoid another lockdown situation later. A stitch in time saves nine, as the saying goes, and the idea behind the announcements this week is that if we act now to dampen the spread, then we can keep schools open, allow pubs and restaurants to continue to trade and enable people to continue to work.
There are also reasons to be cautiously optimistic: thanks to our comprehensive and generous response in March, we have seen three consecutive month of economic growth, millions of people have moved off the furlough and back to work, and consumer spending is returning.
But the resurgence of the virus threatens our recovery. Now it is clear we have to live with coronavirus for months to come, this means the economy cannot return to exactly as it looked in March and the economic rationale for the next phase of support must be different to that which came before.
So today, the Government is focussing on dealing with the problems businesses face right now – supporting viable jobs through a time of depressed demand:
- The Job Support Scheme directly funds businesses to protect these viable jobs and people’s wages, rather than laying employees off through a difficult winter.
- The Government have also acted to minimise the strains on companies’ cashflows so they can focus their resources on supporting employment. Pay as You Grow will cut Bounce Back loan repayments by almost half by extending the loans to 10 years, the extension to our temporary VAT cut to Spring 2021 will support vulnerable hospitality and tourism businesses, and our new payment plans will allow companies to defer VAT and tax liabilities for a further year.
George commented, "The measures announced by the Chancellor are very welcome and will be hugely beneficial to constituents across Camborne, Redruth and Hayle. I know that many have anxieties about what may happen in the months ahead, and I hope that this package of economic stimulus will be of some reassurance to those who are experiencing difficult times.
"My office in Camborne is still opening to assist people with problems in their lives but to reduce the risk of the virus we are encouraging people, wherever possible, to contact us by email or telephone. I am also doing regular telephone surgeries to discuss issues with local residents. If you have an issue that you would like to discuss with elf or the team that supports me then please call 01209 713355 or email [email protected]."
