Small beer as less than six per cent of MPs clamber aboard the Escalator debate
By: JimOldfield
July 10th, 2012
The Beer Escalator debate has finally had its airing in the corridors of power… with just 38 of the nation’s 650 MPs finding time to turn out, in the early hours of last Tuesday morning to discuss the threat to one of Britain’s few thriving industries.
Led by Tory “beer rebel” MP Gavin Williamson, the clutch of members opposing the tax that Conservative Chancellor George Osborne refuses to can, were indeed mostly his Tory colleagues.
Leading the charge up the escalator, Mr Williamson warned: “The simple reality is that beer duty is getting to the point where it is too high, and it’s pricing people out of the market”.
But Treasury Minister Chloe Smith countered by saying the Government had to cut the budget deficit.
And she claimed: “The decline that some talk about in the industry is influenced by a number of factors – people’s habits are changing, people have more choice.
“The moving of the escalator would not solve this problem.”
However, she agreed to further meetings with MPs on the impact of beer duty following the adjournment debate – a move which was welcomed by the British Beer & Pub Association.
BBPA chief executive Brigid Simmonds said: “A growing number of MPs are saying that the Government’s current tax policy for beer simply doesn’t add up.
“With Beer Tax up 42 per cent in four years, tax revenues are being undermined, jobs are being lost, especially in pubs, and a great British manufacturing industry is thwarted from fulfilling its true potential, at home and abroad.
“Chloe Smith has said the issue will be kept under review – thanks to the many MPs from all parties who showed such strong support last night.”
A “Save Your Pint” campaign and e-petition against the tax has already amassed over 60,000 signatures in just a few months – with the industry’s organisers aiming for 100,000 names to force a more meaningful debate on Parliament.
The Escalator tax is actually a Labour invention – introduced by the last Government and retained by Osborne despite heavy criticism.
It automatically increases the tax on beer by two per cent OVER the rate of inflation, every year until 2014.
Since the tax came in, in 2008, the tax has rocketed by 42 per cent – including five per cent slapped on at the last budget.
A third of the cost of every pint now goes into the Chancellor’s purse – as Britons pay 13 times more beer tax than the Germans, 12 times more than the Spanish and nine times more than the French. Brewing industry experts are in no doubt that the parlous state of Britain’s pubs, and indeed the future industry as a whole – one of the few growing through the current recession – is being jeopardised by the tax.
Hand-Pumped link:
Save Your Pint homepage
E-petition
