MPs Hague and Umunna battle over business
THE SPAT between Conservative and Labour politicians over the state of British business intensified yesterday when Chuka Umunna took on William Hague.
Foreign secretary William Hague reproached critics of last week’s Queen’s Speech who say it did not go far enough in its measures to boost UK business.
“I think they should be getting on with the task of creating more of those jobs and more of those exports, rather than complaining about it,” Hague said during an interview with the Telegraph.
He continued: “There’s only one growth strategy – work hard! And do more with less, that’s the 21st century.”
Hague said his calls go further than the infamous “get on your bike and look for work” comment attributed to Lord Norman Tebbit: “It’s more than that, it’s ‘get on the plane, go and sell things overseas’.”
The one-time Tory leader said: “With a flat Eurozone but economies in the rest of the world able to expand, Britain has to reorientate itself in that direction.”
He claimed UK exports increased by £50bn in 2011, and argued that the reforms implemented by the coalition government “will be seen in the 2020s as being as important to this country as the trade union reforms and privatisations were of the 1980s”.
But despite Hague’s mention of cutting corporation tax to “historic low levels”, Labour shadow business secretary Chuka Umunna remained unimpressed with the government’s attempts to build business in the UK.
Umunna called Hague “out of touch”, claiming that he and other ministers have ignored criticisms from business leaders who say that the government has “lost the plot”.
The Labour MP said: “His comments are typical of an out of touch government that refuses to listen and refuses to take responsibility for its own economic policy failures.”
Umunna called David Cameron, George Osborne and William Hague “the biggest roadblocks” to the active government involvement that businesses want.