Starmer urged to introduce wealth tax as an alternative of reducing incapacity advantages
Good morning. “You want me to cut £1bn. Shall I take £100 each off 10 million people, or £1,000 each off 1 million people?” The previous Tory chancellor Ken Clarke is credited with developing with this rationalization of what massive quantity spending cuts really imply, however each chancellor has in all probability thought the identical.
Tomorrow the federal government is anticipated to introduced incapacity cuts stated to be value no less than £5bn. You possibly can work out the maths. That’s greater than 3 times as a lot because the £1.5bn saved by reducing the winter gas fee, the only coverage resolution that has carried out greater than the rest to make the federal government unpopular. So it’s not laborious to work out why Keir Starmer is going through Labour turmoil over this resolution.
(To be honest, the winter gas fee was an instantaneous minimize. The figures briefed about how a lot cash the federal government desires to save lots of by reducing incapacity advantages appear to confer with financial savings by the top of the last decade. However we don’t know the main points at this level. Final week the New Economics Basis, a leftwing thinktank, claimed that cuts could possibly be value as a lot as £9bn by 2029-30.)
Laborious details is perhaps in brief provide this morning, however remark isn’t. With 24 hours to go earlier than one of many greatest bulletins of the Keir Starmer premiership, a number of persons are staking out positions. Listed here are among the key developments.
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Diane Abbott, the Labour leftwinger and mom of the Commons, has urged the federal government to impose a wealth tax as a substitute for reducing disabilty advantages. In an interview on the In the present day programme, requested what she would do as an alternative, Abbott replied:
I’d introduce the wealth tax. In case you introduced in a wealth tax of simply 2% on folks with belongings over £10m, that might elevate £24bn a yr. That’s what I’d do.
That is broadly just like what the Inexperienced celebration was proposing on the final election.
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Andy Burnham, the Labour mayor of Higher Manchester, has joined these expressing considerations in regards to the plans. In an article for the Occasions, he says:
I’d share considerations about altering help and eligibility to advantages whereas leaving the present top-down system broadly in place. It will lure too many individuals in poverty. And to be clear: there is no such thing as a case in any state of affairs for reducing the help obtainable to disabled people who find themselves unable to work.
He says Higher Manchester’s Stay Effectively initiative is a mannequin for the way people who find themselves ailing will be supported again into work.
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Abbott has stated that opposition to the federal government’s plans for incapacity profit cuts isn’t just coming from the left. In her interview on the In the present day programme, she stated she agreed with what Burnham is saying, and he or she stated she additionally agreed with Ed Balls, who stated final week that reducing advantages for these most in want was not one thing Labour ought to be doing. Abbott, Burnham and Balls had been three of the candidates within the 2010 Labour management contest. A fourth, Ed Miliband, can be reported sad in regards to the cuts, though as a cupboard minister he has not spoken out publicly.
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Emma Reynolds, a Treasury minister, has stated the federal government is “for the time being not going to come forward with a wealth tax”. She stated this in an interview on the In the present day programme, when requested if the federal government can be following Abbott’s recommendation. Reynolds stated the federal government had already raised taxes affecting rich folks.
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Reynolds urged Labour MPs and others to attend for the main points of the plans earlier than coming to a verdict on them. In feedback implying the ultimate proposals won’t be as draconian as among the pre-briefing has implied, she stated:
Some colleagues are leaping to conclusions about our plans earlier than they’ve heard them. So I simply urge them to be affected person.
When it was put to right here that she was saying a few of their considerations is perhaps addressed once they learn the precise proposals, Reynolds stated there had been “a lot of speculation about what we might or might not do”.
We’ll set out additional particulars, however the severely disabled and essentially the most susceptible will all the time get help, and there’ll all the time be a security internet.
The federal government is reportedly specializing in reducing incapacity and incapacity advantages to stem rising spending and help extra folks into work. However whereas the system wants reform, Ministers look like centered on reducing private independence funds (Pip) – a profit that isn’t associated to work.
The inspiration warns that reducing Pip by £5bn in 2029-30, for instance by elevating the brink to qualify for help, may see round 620,000 folks shedding £675 per thirty days, on common. The Basis provides that 70 per cent of those cuts can be targeting households within the poorest half of the revenue distribution.
Right here is the agenda for the day.
9.30am: Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, is assembly the heads of regulatory companies in Downing Road to debate their plans to spice up progress. Later Reeves is recording broadcast interviews.
11.30am: Downing Road holds a foyer briefing.
Midday: Nigel Farage and different Reform UK MPs maintain a press convention to make what they name “a special announcement”.
2.30pm: Liz Kendall, the work and pensions secretary, takes questions within the Commons.
After 3.30pm: David Lammy, the international secretary, is anticipated to make a Commons assertion about Ukraine.
After 4.30pm: MPs begin debating the remaining phases of the kids’s wellbeing and faculties invoice.
5.35pm: Kemi Badenoch offers a speech on the CPS’s Margaret Thatcher Convention on Remaking Conservatism. Different audio system earlier within the day embody George Osborne, the previous chancellor, who’s doing a Q&A at 3.35pm.
Early night: Keir Starmer meets Mark Carney, the brand new Canadian PM, in Downing Road.
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Key occasions
Former Financial institution of England deputy warns Rachel Reeves in opposition to kneejerk cuts
The previous Financial institution of England deputy governor Charlie Bean has warned the chancellor in opposition to making kneejerk cuts in subsequent week’s spring assertion to attempt to hit fiscal targets which might be 5 years away, Heather Stewart studies.
At 3.30pm a justice minister will reply an pressing query from Robert Jenrick, the shadow justice secretary, in regards to the new tips from the Sentencing Council that he claims quantity to “two-tier justice”.
After that, at about 4.15pm, David Lammy, the international secretary, will make an announcement on the assembly of G7 international ministers he attended in Canada.
Liberal Democrats revive name for UK to hitch customs union with EU after OECD revises progress forecast down
The Liberal Democrats have responded to as we speak’s downwards revision of its UK progress forecast by the OECD (see 10.55am) by reviving their name for Britain to hitch a customs union with the EU. Daisy Cooper, the Lib Dem deputy chief and Treasury spokesperson, stated:
The chancellor can’t ignore this regular drumbeat of financial distress any longer. Trump’s mindless tariffs and the federal government’s personal financial insurance policies are performing as an anchor on any significant progress.
On the spring assertion, Rachael Reeves can’t bury her head within the sand. She should admit that her Price range has failed to interrupt from the years of Conservative financial vandalism.
The chancellor should change course by first scrapping her growth-crushing jobs tax which is about to hammer small companies, and second, by embracing the thought of a bespoke UK-EU customs union which might unleash progress.
Solely then will we see the expansion wanted to rebuild our public providers and correctly shield household funds.
No 10 says greater than 30 nations now concerned in ‘coalition of keen’ plan for Ukraine – some with troops, extra in different methods
Downing Road has stated that greater than 30 nations could possibly be concerned within the “coalition of the willing” plan to supply navy help to Ukraine within the occasion of a peace deal.
The PM’s spokesperson stated Keir Starmer stated, after the digital summit that he hosted on Saturday, that completely different nations would offer completely different capabilities.
The spokesperson went on:
In relation to what the coalition are keen to have the ability to present, we’re anticipating greater than 30 nations to be concerned, however clearly the contribution capabilities will fluctuate.
However this will probably be a big pressure, with important variety of nations offering troops, and a bigger group contributing in different methods.
For example of how nations may contribute with out offering troops, the spokesperson stated:
As an illustration, if one nation was capable of present quick jets to Ukraine, it’s not simply the jets that it’s good to take into consideration. The place these jets get gas? The place they’ll be based mostly? How they dock into the broader navy exercise on the bottom? Who’s offering engineering help? Whether or not these jets have come off a deployment the place one other nation is required to backfill the deployment? The place these crews are being home? How we’re rotating them out and in? How we are able to enhance any airfields required for touchdown?
That’s the type of element that the navy companions will probably be entering into.
Requested what number of nations had been keen to supply troops, the spokesperson wouldn’t transcend saying a “significant number”.
When it was put to the spokesperson that solely 27 nations participated within the on-line summit on Saturday, he stated that among the nations keen to contribute to the “coalition of the willing” weren’t obtainable for the decision on Saturday.
No 10 rejects declare that incapacity cuts plan primarily pushed by want to economize
Downing Road has rejected claims that its proposed modifications to incapacity advantages are primarily motivated by the necessity to economize.
On the morning foyer briefing, when it was put to the PM’s spokesperson that ministers are proposing cuts due to the “fiscal backdrop”, he replied:
No, I feel while you have a look at the truth that now we have the very best stage of working-age inactivity on account of ailing well being in western Europe, we’re the one main financial system whose employment fee hasn’t recovered for the reason that pandemic, there’s a responsibility to repair the damaged system that’s letting tens of millions of individuals on this nation down.
Requested why Britain is the one main financial system the place employment has not returned to pre-pandemic ranges, he stated that was as a result of “we’ve got a broken welfare system, a broken labour market system that has not got people back into work adequately”.
However at one other level within the briefing the spokesperson stated there was each “a moral and an economic case” for fixing the welfare system.
Requested to verify that some disabled folks unable to work can be left worse off because of the modifications being introduced tomorrow, the spokesperson wouldn’t rule this out. As a substitute he replied:
The system clearly wants reform. Whenever you see the numerous enhance within the numbers of people who find themselves inactive, or who’re forecast to go on to the [disability benefits] system, I feel it’s clear that the system isn’t working as meant.
However we’re all the time going to make sure that the system continues to help these with biggest want.
Ben Quinn
Ben Quinn is a senior Guardian reporter.
Nigel Farage, the Reform UK chief, stated his celebration wanted “old lags” as he introduced the names of 29 councillors who’ve defected to his celebration from the Conservatives, Liberal Democrats and others. He additionally stated that the announcement was being made as an instance the inroads which he says Reform has been making throughout Britain.
Nonetheless, whereas the announcement comes forward of native elections in Might, it’s additionally laborious to not view the timing as an try to realize the initiative after the outbreak of a Reform civil struggle after the suspension of the Nice Yarmouth MP Rupert Lowe.
Farage advised a press convention in central London that there had been “turbulence” because of the controversy, however he insisted that any “upset” was on the edges of what he described because the Reform “family”.
He went on to say {that a} senior member of the celebration had been subjected to on-line abuse and “outright racism.” Whereas he didn’t identify him, this may look like a reference to the Reform UK Chairman, Zia Yusuf.
On Reform Fb teams in latest weeks, Yusuf has been the goal of criticism and remarks that do seem in some circumstances to be islamophobic in nature.
Amongst these listening to Farage had been the remaining Reform MPs, together with Lee Anderson, who was suspended from his final celebration, the Conservatives over feedback he made in regards to the mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, which had been broadly criticised as islamophobic.
Farage names 29 councillors who’ve joined or defected to Reform UK, saying they present celebration ‘very a lot on the up’
Nigel Farage then went on to verify that 29 councillors have just lately defected to Reform UK – or no less than joined the celebration after sitting as independents.
He names all of them, explaining in every case the place they’ve come from.
He ends saying:
We’re rising, we’re constructing. We’re deepening, we’re broadening, we’re strengthening. We’re preparing for the primary of Might. This celebration could be very, very a lot on the up.
For the reason that checklist doesn’t appear to be obtainable on Reform’s web site, I’ll publish them right here for the document.
The 29 newest Councillors to hitch Reform UK are:
Invoice Barrett – Ashford Borough Council, Singleton East, (Beforehand: Impartial)
Cathy Hunt – Durham County Council, Woodhouse Shut (Beforehand: Impartial)
Christine Palmer – Swale Borough Council, Hartlip, Newington and Upchurch (Beforehand: Impartial)
Claire Johnson-Wooden – Powys County Council, Llanyre with Nantmel (Beforehand: Impartial)
Dirk Ross – Kent County Council, Ashford South (Beforehand: Impartial)
Edward Kirk – Wiltshire Council, Trowbridge Adcroft (Beforehand: Conservative)
Emma Ellison – Blackpool Council, Norbreck (Beforehand: Conservative)
Felix Bloomfield – Oxfordshire County Council – (Beforehand: Conservative)
Geoff Morgan – Powys County Council, Ithon Valley (Beforehand: Impartial)
Graham McAndrew – Hertfordshire County Council, Bishop’s Stortford Rural (Beforehand: Conservative)
Heather Asker – Uttlesford District Council, Saffron Walden Citadel (Beforehand: Residents for Uttlesford)
Iain McIntosh – Powys County Council, Yscir with Honddu Isaf and Llanddew (Beforehand: Conservative)
Jan O’Hara – North Northamptonshire Council, Burton and Broughton (Beforehand: Conservative)
Joanne Monk – Worcestershire County Council, Arrow Valley East (Beforehand: Conservative)
Julian Kirk – King’s Lynn & West Norfolk Borough Council, Walsoken, West Walton and Walpole (Beforehand: Conservative)
Kirk Harrison – North Northamptonshire, Irthlingborough (Beforehand: Conservative)
Mandy Clare – Chester West and Chester Council, Winsford Dene (Beforehand: Impartial Labour)
Manzur Hasan – South Holland District Council, Spalding St John’s (Beforehand: Impartial)
Matthew Salter – Lancashire County Council, Wyre Rural Central (Beforehand: Conservative)
Paul Ellison – Wyre Council, Marsh Mill (Beforehand: Conservative)
Paul Irwin – Buckinghamshire Council, Stone and Waddesdon (Beforehand: Conservative)
Reg Kain – Cheshire East Council, Alsager (Beforehand: Liberal Democrat)
Richard Palmer – Swale Borough Council, Hartlip, Newington and Upchurch (Beforehand: Impartial)
Robert Gibson – South Holland District Council, Spalding St Paul’s (Beforehand: Impartial)
Stephen Atkinson – Ribble Valley Borough Council, Brockhall and Dinckley (Beforehand: Conservative)
Stephen Reed – North East Derbyshire District Council, Killamarsh East (Beforehand: Conservative)
Stuart Davies – North Somerset Council, Wick St Lawrence and St Georges (Beforehand: Impartial)
Thomas Sneath – South Holland District Council, Moulton, Weston and Cowbit (Beforehand: Impartial)
Vernon Smith – Gloucestershire County Council, Tewkesbury East (Beforehand: Conservative)
Farage accuses media of not reporting how Reform UK’s chair Zia Yusuf topic to racist assaults on-line
Again on the Reform UK press convention, Nigel Farage has simply referred briefly to his fall-out with Rupert Lowe, who has been suspended over misconduct allegation he strongly denies that had been solely made public by the celebration after Lowe criticised Farage in an interview.
Farage stated the row induced some “consternation”, however had not held up Reform’s election planning.
However he stated the dispute led to a senior determine within the celebration (Zia Yusuf, the chair – though Farage didn’t identify him) being topic to racist abuse on social media. He claims journalists would have turned this into an enormous story if it had occurred to a politician from some other celebration, nevertheless it was ignored as a result of it was Reform.
He stated the one “honourable exception” was the Occasions columnist and Tory peer Daniel Finkelstein. He’s referring to this column by Finkelstein printed final week. Finkeslstein stated:
As a result of he’s clearly articulate and intelligent, and since he’s a Muslim and has labored for Goldman Sachs, Yusuf is an emblem of the modernisation — the broadening — Farage believes important. However, for a similar motive, the deepeners [people in the party who want a ‘deeper’ version of Reform – like Lowe] need him gone. Wading via on-line feedback about Yusuf’s ethnicity and business success isn’t an edifying expertise.
Tories declare OECD’s downwards revision of UK progress forecast exhibits ‘warning lights flashing pink’
The Conservatives are claiming that as we speak’s OECD downwards revision of its UK progress forecasts (see 10.55am) exhibits “the warning lights are flashing red”. In an announcement, Mel Stride, the shadow chancellor, stated:
It ought to come as no shock that the UK’s progress forecasts have been downgraded after Labour has trashed the financial system.
Issues are set to get harder, with Labour’s jobs tax lurking on the horizon. With 9 days to go till Labour’s emergency price range, the warning lights are flashing pink.
That is the newest embarrassment for Keir Starmer after he made progress his primary mission.
On the Reform UK press convention Zia Yusuf, the celebration chair, claims that his celebration had achieved “the most historic acceleration politically in British history”. He goes on:
We’ve surged from 14% help nationally to 26% within the common of the ballot. We’ve signed up over 160,000 new, totally paid up members. We’ve opened 400 branches, we’ve held over 30 occasions, loved by tens of hundreds of attendees throughout this nice nation.
(Anybody who remembers the rise of the SDP might contest this.)
Yusuf is adopted by Nigel Farage, the celebration chief, who says Reform have an enormous alternative on the native elections. He says Labour has acquired off to a poor begin, the financial system is faltering, and the Conservative celebration stands for nothing.
