Reeves to ignore funding options to tax on wealth above £10m and instead will go ahead and cut winter fuel payments following a cross-party proposal by MPs who urged Rachel Reeves to impose 2% tax on wealth above £10m.
The move would raise £24bn a year say signatories including Jeremy Corbyn who is backed by his former Chancellor. This would be a simple wealth tax on Britain’s rich in next week’s budget rather than announce spending cuts that would hit the most poor hardest.
Reeves to ignore funding options to tax on wealth
The signatories from Labour, including Diane Abbot, all four Green MPs, the Liberal Democrats, Plaid Cymru, the Social Democratic and Labour party and the Alliance party of Northern Ireland, as well as independents, argue that wealth is under-taxed in the UK and a new levy on the rich would generate a “large stream of revenue”.
As an alternative, the chancellor has explored raising existing taxes on wealth, including through inheritances and capital gains, but has been lobbied hard by the banking sector and has been forced to rule out an explicit new levy on wealth.
Former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn
In a letter to the chancellor, the MPs – including proposals by the former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and his then shadow chancellor, John McDonnell (Labour) – say she could raise over £24bn a year from a 2% tax on wealth above £10m and lay the foundations for a fairer, more sustainable economy.
The letter was organised by the campaign group Green New Deal Rising, says in contrast to the general trend, taxes on the very richest are only fair in the current climate and slightly more onerous than they were in the mid-1960s.
Labour’s first Budget for 14 years will be delivered by Chancellor Rachel Reeves on Wednesday 30 October. She has warned that it will involve “difficult decisions”.
Government sources have told Yvonne Ridley in her Westminster Whispers show that the October Budget will include tax rises and spending cuts to the value of £40bn. The 2024 autumn Budget is on Wednesday, 30 October.