10:26 Lyn Brown (West Ham) (Lab)

During the last year of the Labour Government, we spent almost 6% of our GDP on publicly funded education and training. By last year, that had fallen to just over 4%—a cut of more than a quarter. Given the challenges we face, we clearly need far more investment in skills and knowledge, to transform our economy, to deal with the climate crisis and to make the fourth industrial revolution prosperous and fair. Instead, as we know, during Tory rule school funding per pupil has fallen by 8% in real terms.

The situation is no different on other issues, such as the climate change crisis: the Chancellor is still trying to obstruct the green investment we need. Thankfully, the right hon. Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Mr Hammond) will not be at the Treasury much longer. Unfortunately, the reckless, regressive and plain idiotic pledges of the Tory leadership contenders do not inspire confidence that anything will change. It is a great pity that the right hon. Lady did not throw her hat in the ring. I have watched what she has been doing over the past few months—I have even watched her videos online—and I thought she might be building up to a bid, but sadly not.

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