More than 3 million workers are expected to receive a pay rise due to increases to the national minimum wage in April, protecting the lowest paid in society. After our changes to the remit, we accepted in full the recommendations of the Low Pay Commission which considers the impact of rates on business, competitiveness, the labour market, the wider economy and the cost of living. Our impact assessments are available only by region—estimates by constituency are not available—but the simple truth is that workers in every constituency are better off under this Labour Government.

Around 140,000 workers in north-east England will feel the benefits of this direct pay rise. I know his North Durham constituency well—I am no stranger to Chester-le-Street—and not only will his constituents get a pay rise, but his local shops, his restaurants, his pubs and more will get what they need most of all: customers who have got a bit of money to spend.

The thing I would cite most of all to the hon. Member’s constituents is the doubling of the employment allowance in the Budget and the threshold being removed, which means that some smaller businesses will actually be paying lower national insurance contributions than they would have paid before the Budget.

As I have said to Conservative Members before, of course we are very sensitive to the aggregate impact of Government policy because frankly having observed the Conservative Governments of the previous 14 years I thought they completely missed this point and at many times had different Departments doing completely opposing things.