Austerity policies in today's autumn budget a 'political choice' that ‘will hit Northern Ireland harder’, says DUP MP Sammy Wilson

The tax increases and spending cuts expected in today’s autumn budget statement will have a “disproportionate impact” in Northern Ireland, a former Finance Minister has warned.
By Niall Deeney
Published 17th Nov 2022, 06:00 GMT
LONDON, ENGLAND - OCTOBER 26: Jeremy Hunt, UK chancellor of the exchequer, leaves the first meeting of the Prime Minister's cabinet at number 10 in Downing Street on October 26, 2022 in London, England. Rishi Sunak's newly formed cabinet featured ministers from both his predecessors' governments. (Photo by Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)LONDON, ENGLAND - OCTOBER 26: Jeremy Hunt, UK chancellor of the exchequer, leaves the first meeting of the Prime Minister's cabinet at number 10 in Downing Street on October 26, 2022 in London, England. Rishi Sunak's newly formed cabinet featured ministers from both his predecessors' governments. (Photo by Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)
LONDON, ENGLAND - OCTOBER 26: Jeremy Hunt, UK chancellor of the exchequer, leaves the first meeting of the Prime Minister's cabinet at number 10 in Downing Street on October 26, 2022 in London, England. Rishi Sunak's newly formed cabinet featured ministers from both his predecessors' governments. (Photo by Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)

Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has warned that “tough” decisions will be needed and the widespread expectation is that public spending will be cut, with more people asked to pay tax.

DUP MP Sammy Wilson, speaking to the News Letter ahead of the budget statement, said his party will urge the government to ensure big technology and energy companies are also forced to pay their fair share of taxes as he warned the expected new austerity policies are a “political choice”.

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"What worries me about what I’ve heard so far is that the government is going to dip into everybody’s pockets,” Mr Wilson said.

"In effect, the government is going to impose a taxation burden on ordinary people, on individuals, equivalent to a 4p increase in the standard rate of taxation. That’s what they reckon they’re going to be. That’s what’s been floated and that is enormous.

“The one thing I haven’t heard about – and this is something we’re going to be pushing the government on – is whether they’re going to be pursuing the Googles, the Facebooks, the Starbucks and the oil companies of this world who have either made profits and aren’t going to be taxed as heavily on them, or who have moved their profits around so that they don’t pay taxes on the profits in the very country in which they made them. They can move profits to the Irish Republic. If the government are going to say we’ve got this burden, then everybody has got to bear it.”

The East Antrim MP, a former economics teacher who held the finance portfolio at Stormont between 2009 and 2013, also questioned the wisdom of the government’s new policies.

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"The government knows we are going into a period of contraction so why is it reinforcing that with these kinds of policies,” he asked. “I think it is a political choice.”

He added: “We [in Northern Ireland] are more vulnerable to fiscal contraction because we’re more dependent on the public sector. Secondly, of course, our economy is already fragile because of the impact of the Protocol.”

Related topics:Sammy WilsonJeremy HuntNorthern IrelandDUPStarbucks