Thirsk, Malton and Filey MP: 'Tax big companies to help cost of living crisis'
Kevin Hollinrake says he's always been a big advocate of clamping down on tax avoiders
The MP for Thirsk, Malton and Filey says he is not against taxing big companies to help with the cost of living.
Kevin Hollinrake says he has always been a big advocate of clamping down on those who avoid paying tax.
He reckons the income generated from that, and implementing a windfall tax, will help low income households.
Kevin also says the Chancellor's Spring statement was aimed to help deal with rising costs of living.
He said: "March was two months ago. You can't keep coming with £21 billion of taxpayers' money to the table all the time with all these global market forces. These are not UK market forces. Supply chain issues, energy prices, these are international issues. I haven't seen any Goevrnment around the world that's provided the level of support this Government has put in to help with that.
"Yes, consumers are paying higher prices. The question is do we then go back to the taxpayer and tax people more to help some consumers who are paying those higher prices? That's what the conversations we're having as somebody's got to pay those higher prices one way or the other, because the Government can't lower prices on its own. It just can't do that.
"I've been a big advocate of clamping down on tax avoidance of big companies like Facebook and Google. I'm not against the windfall tax on companies like Shell and BP. I would put that money into helping UK consumers, particularly low income households, so I'm not against that at all.
"I think we can probably get £4-£5 billion off those big companies that we could put straight into those low income households and I think we should. As a backbencher I'm on the Treasury Select Committee, which means we can have a formal say in terms of communicating with the Treasury, but as a backbencher you have influence not power. I can nudge, persuade and argue for and I hope that has effect."