Disgraced ex-Cabinet minister Damian Green appeared on the BBC’s Question Time last night and gave away more than he was probably meant to.
Theresa May – and her chancellor Philip Hammond – has mentioned tax rises as part of her claimed additional investment in the NHS – which the Tories have spent the last eight years starving of funding – but only alongside her supposed ‘Brexit dividend’.
A ‘Brexit dividend’ that even the government’s Office for Budget Responsibility has said will actually be a Brexit deficit.
But when challenged by David Dimbleby to say which taxes would rise, Green let slip the truth – all of them:
Low earners already pay far more in taxes as a percentage of their income than the wealthy, while the richest and large companies use schemes to reduce their tax bill to insignificance.
But May intends to pile a bigger tax burden on everyone – which in practice will mean that ordinary people will shoulder the burden while the rich and companies just pay a little extra to their tax planners to avoid it.
Labour, by contrast, have a clear plan and only the richest five percent of earners will pay more in taxes, while companies will be made to pay their share.
Comment:
As ever, Theresa May and her party avoid honesty about the interminable bad news they are creating, while deflecting constantly from their incompetence, cowardice and heartlessness that cause it.
But the truth slips out…
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Of course they’ll put up taxes for poor people. It’s more about hammering home the lie that ‘taxation funds spending’ than actual need. How can they outsource so called ‘profitable NHS services’ if they admit taxes don’t fund anything. We never had a problem finding the money for two new carrier groups for the US navy or renting the latest nuclear missile system.
“But May intends to pile a bigger tax burden on everyone.”
Talking of taxes as a ‘burden’ plays into the hands of those who want to slash services. We have seen this in the USA a great deal. It frames the debate as if taxation is a very negative thing.
Please be careful with the language that you use.
Thank you.
I have to disagree with you here, Tony. Taxation is indeed a burden when it rests disproportionately on the narrow shoulders of the poor in order to relieve the much more ‘deserving’ rich.
Corbyn is right: higher taxes for wealthy corporations and individuals, no tax rises for the rest of us. Many workers on low pay are already having to go to food banks in order to eat, some poor families cannot afford soap and other personal hygiene products, and evictions are at an all-time high with people decanted on to the streets to face the ravages of the elements in all weathers. Surely you would not dispute that taxation is a burden on those in this situation.
Interestingly, a newspaper report today reveals that the Labour Party has calculated that “…the richest in society will have been handed one hundred and ten billion pounds by 2022.” as a result of the cuts in corporation tax and capital gains tax introduced by the Tory/LibDem coalition.
‘Corporates will pay; individuals will pay’
WHICH corporates and WHICH individuals?
Don’t bother, we all know the answer: NO corporates and every individual on PAYE.
Yes the NHS is a great socialist achievement, fought for by our forefathers and mothers in Labour and Trade Unions but tragically now in the hands of Neo-Liberal Tory Barbarians like the Mediocre Bore Hunt!
But brothers and sisters whilst it was always a great reform for us it has always been a fantastic subsidy for capital as we pay and they pay nothing for all these free healthy workers.
And of course to the Tory Neo-Liberal Barbarians once you are retired you are surplus to requirement, what profit is there in YOU apart from in private Care Homes?
You may be too soft Brothers and Sisters -make the rich and powerful Bastards pay for NHS increases through tax – it is our wealth anyway, legally stolen by the Little People (Barbarians) at the ‘Top’.
Oh and on the 70th Anniversary of the NHS thank you to all its staff including migrants and the Wonderful Windrush Generation!
Solidarity!