GEORGE Osborne has mocked the Labour leadership, noting how it wanted to put taxes up in Scotland and claiming it was now living in a “parallel universe”.
The Chancellor’s broadside came as MPs engaged in the final debate on the Queen’s Speech, the Tory Government’s programme for the coming months, and passed it by a majority of 60.
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But the Commons only did so after a rebellion by 43 pro-Brexit Tories forced the Government to tell the Queen that MPs "regret" the omission from the “humble address” of protection for the NHS from an EU-US trade deal, so-called TTIP, and private competition.
In what was described as an "unprecedented humiliation", the Commons approved the Queen's Speech by 297 votes to 237 but only after the Government agreed to add the rebel amendment to avoid an embarrassing defeat.
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Senior Tory and Outer Peter Lilley, who led the rebellion, kept the pressure on by demanding a new bill to protect the NHS from TTIP before the EU referendum on June 23; a failure to do so meant the “only sure way to protect our NHS will be to vote to leave the EU”.
Work and Pensions Secretary Stephen Crabb insisted: "I'm absolutely clear our National Health Service is protected from TTIP."
Earlier during heated exchanges, Mr Osborne held aloft a copy of an inquiry by Labour into why it had lost the last General Election and the aftermath.
"If the verdict of this report is Labour is on life support, the policies of the shadow chancellor are 'do not resuscitate'; that is what he's condemning the Labour Party to."
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But John McDonnell, intervening, said: "Could I remind you, the Tory Party just lost every mayoral election in the recent elections?"
However, the Chancellor pointed out Labour had suffered the worst results for an Opposition party in more than 30 years at the May 5 UK-wide elections, saying: "They were reduced to third place in Scotland and they think it's a good set of results…If they want to carry on in this parallel universe, that suits us just fine."
Mr Osborne emphasised to MPs how the Opposition motion mentioned Scotland.
"It says it 'regrets the refusal of the Scottish Government to use its new tax powers to put an end to austerity in Scotland'. Now what that is actually code for is they want to put taxes up in Scotland.
"They fought the election in Scotland proposing…a 1p increase in the basic rate of income tax; that was the Scottish Labour Party's policy that was so successful at that election…,” quipped the Chancellor.
Labour’s John McDonnell described the Queen's Speech as "fictional drivel," insisting most of the Government-written lines about the economy were false or amounted to "doublespeak".
The shadow chancellor said Britain’s economic recovery was "built on sand" with high consumer debt and a “record high” deficit.
Labour's amendment called for the Government to adopt its fiscal credibility rule to balance day-to-day spending while borrowing to invest in infrastructure.
For the SNP, Stewart Hosie told MPs the Conservative programme had been “pared back” because of bitter Tory in-fighting over Europe.
What was missing in the gracious speech, explained the Nationalists’ Treasury spokesman, was an alternative to Tory austerity, real action on productivity, innovation, trade and exports, and “essentially addressing the crying need for genuine inclusive growth…”
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