9 September 2021
Sir Mike Penning backs Government on Health and Social Care Levy

Sir Mike Penning, Member of Parliament for Hemel Hempstead, spoke in support of the Government in the debate on the Health and Social Care Levy yesterday.

The new tax levy will enable the NHS to tackle the backlog and provide a new, permanent way to pay for reforms to social care.

Sir Mike told MPs that the problem of funding for social care had been kicked down to the road for far too long and, whilst not perfect, this new levy is the best available solution to tackle the problem.

The levy will also provide funding to enable the NHS to tackle the backlog of appointments and operations that has built up as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Speaking afterwards, Sir Mike said:

“I am concerned that we are breaking a manifesto commitment here, but we do have to be realistic. Our manifesto was written before the pandemic, and everything has changed since then. It would be totally unacceptable for us to carry on behaving is if it had never happened.

“Every day I get letters from constituents worried about missed hospital and doctor appointments, it is absolutely the right thing to do to take action to deal with this.

“I am a fiscal conservative, and it would be wrong for us to keep borrowing our way out of this. We have enough debt already with the money borrowed – quite rightly - to pay for the furlough scheme and other covid support packages.

“We can’t just pass it all on to future generations.

“It is not perfect by any means, but it is the right thing to do, and I think most reasonable people recognise that.”