Karen Bradley MP: 100 apprenticeships in 100 days — the challenge in Staffordshire Moorlands

Karen Bradley is MP for Staffordshire Moorlands. Follow her on Twitter here.

Today is the launch of my campaign to find 100 apprenticeships in 100 days for Staffordshire Moorlands. I’m really excited to be spearheading this local effort with the support of the National Apprenticeship Service (NAS) and the Leek Post and Times. I hope I am also setting an example by recruiting an apprentice myself.

The double-whammy benefit of apprenticeships ought to be obvious: they provide a financially efficient way of bringing enthusiastic people into work, and offer young apprentices personal and career development as they learn a trade. Research shows that apprenticeships provide companies with loyal, skilled staff who stay with them longer, and the NAS estimates that apprentices earn £100,000 more over their careers than comparable job starters.

Karen Bradley MP: Cut the 50p rate, cut corporation tax, cut capital gains tax

Charlie Elphicke introduces an eight part series of articles from Conservative MPs on turbocharging Britain's growth rate here.

The series being run jointly by ConHome and the Centre for Policy Studies is kicked off today by Karen Bradley; the MP for Staffordshire Moorlands.

One of the few levers available to government to stimulate growth is tax. The right tax system can lead to increased tax revenues while also encouraging growth. For individuals and for businesses, tax is usually the single biggest bill and the difference between profit and loss, savings or debt. But for government, tax is the only way to fund public services.

The Coalition has been clear that it wants the recovery to be driven by private sector growth. The right fiscal environment can help by encouraging private sector businesses to grow and create more jobs. That means a the tax system that is simple, certain and competitive. This approach should also raise more revenue for the taxman – the question is how?

There are three tax areas that could provide fiscal stiumlus – indirect taxes, personal taxes and business taxes. Taking indirect taxes first, there would be a short term boost to the economy by cutting the rate of VAT, but the impact of higher inflation and personal debt would have a devasting long term impact. We cannot buy our way out of debt.