Liz Truss has been accused of leaving it to working people to pick up the tab for the cost of living crisis.
The new Tory leader came under pressure to spell out who will pay for the multi billion pound emergency bail out to keep the lights on in people’s homes this winter.
Labour leader Keir Starmer and the SNP’s Ian Blackford cornered Truss in her first Commons appearance as Prime Minister with demands that she impose a windfall tax on the massive profits bring made by energy companies. Starmer accused Truss of protecting the profits of Shell and giving Amazon a tax break rather than helping families when she unveils a package to freeze domestic bills later this week.
Truss will give a statement to Parliament tomorrow on her plan to freeze energy bills. Instead she is expected to put the £100 billion bill onto the national debt by borrowing more money.
She said: "I believe it is the wrong thing to be putting companies off investing in the UK just as we need to be growing the economy."
Starmer welcomed the adoption of a Labour plan but said the real question was how the proposal should be paid for.
He added: “The Prime Minister knows she has now choice but to back an energy price freeze, but it won’t be cheap and the real choice, the political choice is who is going to pay.
He told the Commons that “energy producers will make £170 billion in excess profits over the next two years”.
Starmer added: “Is she really telling us that she is going to leave this vast excess profits on the table and make working people foot the bill for decades to come?”
Truss replied: “I’m on the side of people who work hard and do the right thing” and scored a point by saying there was nothing new about Labour leader’s demanding higher taxes.
"That is why we will reverse the national insurance increase and that is why we will keep corporation tax low, because ultimately we want investment right across our country, we want new jobs and new opportunities and that is what I will deliver as Prime Minister.”
'Falling apart'
Blackford said the Prime Minister’s reputation for straight talking is already “falling apart”, after she ruled out a windfall tax.
The SNP leader was met with regular chorus of groans from excitable Conservative benches even as he rose to congratulate the Prime Minister.
But, he added: “I’m sorry to say that her reputation for straight talking is falling apart at the first PMQs. After nine questions she’s still not told us who will pay for her energy plan. Prime Minister, today the public are waiting to find out the response to the economic crisis and they want answers.
“Will she freeze energy prices at their current levels, and will it be paid for by a windfall tax?”
Truss said: “No it won’t be paid for by a windfall tax. I don’t believe we can tax our way to growth.”
The PM showed she was not scared to goad the SNP, by attacking the party’s stance against new nuclear stations in Scotland.
She said: “What I want to see, is I want to see us using more of our UK energy supply, including more oil and gas from the North Sea, and nuclear, and nuclear power in Scotland as well. And I hope I can count on the SNP’s support for that.”
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