Chris Elmore, MP for Ogmore, calls for an emergency Budget to tackle the cost-of-living crisis as the National Insurance rise hits Ogmore constituents’ pay packets this week.
Families in Ogmore have already been hit with record rises in energy prices, record high petrol prices and staggeringly steep hikes in the cost of food and other essentials. As new economic forecasts raise concerns about the spiralling cost of living, and the UK expected to see the lowest growth and highest inflation in the G7 next year, the Labour Party is demanding action from the UK Tory Government.
The UK Tory Government has offered no solutions for the cost-of-living crisis thus far. The buy now, pay later energy loan just kicks the can down the road. The National Insurance rise, framed as a funding stream for social care, has seemingly been spent many times over and any hypothetical benefits don’t arrive until years down the line. This piles on pressure to family’s budgets who are caring for loved ones and sees carers left with little support.
An emergency Budget should prioritise 5 measures that could be enacted now to make a material difference to the millions of pensioners and working people feeling financial pressure from the crisis. These include putting a one-off windfall tax on oil and gas producers to cut home energy bills, scrapping the National Insurance hike and providing support for struggling businesses by giving small and medium sized enterprises a discount on their business rates bill worth up to £5,700 this year.
A failure to implement an emergency Budget not only shows neglect for people up and down the country it shows the economic incompetence of the UK Tory Government to get the economy firing on all cylinders again.
Chris Elmore, MP for Ogmore, said:
“Following another week of the Prime Minister and Chancellor focusing on saving their own skins, the UK Tory Government is continuing to fail to do anything to address the spiralling cost of living crisis. Instead most people saw their pay packet squeezed further as the UK Tory Government hit workers with a National Insurance hike.
People in Ogmore deserve so much better from the UK Government to help them through these difficult times, which is why I am calling for an emergency Budget to bring in urgently needed measures to alleviate financial pressure.
Labour have put forward sensible, costed, practical measures that would give immediate help to working people and pensioners across Ogmore. The UK Government should hold an emergency Budget to enact them and address the gap left empty by the spring statement.”