This may be unpopular - but what about the squeezed middle?

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They are talking about raising taxes on the average person now. Which will really effect lower middle class families who are already feeling the pinch due to increases in cost of food, gas and electic, increasing childcare costs and rent or morgage increases. They are going to increase pensions and benefits with inflation but lots of middle class earners are not having their wages increased with inflation but will now have their taxes increased. What about help for the middle class, especially lower middle class and working class who earn slightly to much to qualify for any help but will now stuggle with all these increases.

That's got to be the concern that the young educate motivated population decide house prices and tax burden and poorer services mean it's not worth living in UK and emigrate for a better deal else where.

It's the price paid by so many on here who voted Tory and were stupid enough to think that successive (Tory) Prime Ministers who messed up this country including the next one who will be holding the post from 12 pm. this evening - and is a multi billionaire -

those who voted Tory were stupid enough to think that people like this would ever do anything towards securing the health and welfare of ANYBODY other than themselves, let alone the squeezed 'middle'...

you are right to worry, when the general election is announced, don't be stupid enough to make the same mistake again eh?

absolutely agree. As others have posted the current generation of pensioners are wealthier than every other generation throughout their lives.

I have to say that if I was looking at emigrating here, UK would not be a top option.
Which is quite sad.
It is so different to 15 years ago. So much worse. The quality of life is shite, healtcare is shite.... Went really downhill

You seem to have a habit of criticising money being spent on those who are vulnerable or poor. Not your first even just today. You must be exceptionally comfortable (i.e. rich, healthy, in employment and heavily insured against all eventualities) to not care what happens to the more vulnerable in society. So I have an answer for you - the rich, and probably you. Tax cuts and reducing public spending do not build a strong economy. Or did you entirely miss what happened to Truss? Plans to cut taxes and reduce public spending tanked the economy. Economics is not a "one answer only" strategy. We have had over a decade of slashing public spending, cutting taxes (mainly for the rich), collaborating with tax avoidance by individuals and companies in the name of "invetstment", and severing ties with our strongest and closest markets to prove some point that escapes me... and look at where we are. Yes, things have to be paid for. But there is not a single method of generating income or a strong economy despite what Tories seem to think.

my parents are immigrants, one has gone home & one is debating.

Many people with a an enviable BMI are not very healthy at all - lots of heart disease in some slim, vegetarian ethnic groups.

Vegetarian doesn’t necessarily mean healthy though, it can mean lots of dairy, it can include Oreo’s and coke. But dealing with proper data and studies, it’s very clear that obesity puts you at a far higher risk of heart disease, diabetes, stroke and certain cancers.

If every time we raise our very real problem we have with a rising level of obesity the response is to focus on excuses or say it’s mean or unfair, you’re really just accepting millions of people will suffer unnecessarily. Why would you not support and promote good health? It’s odd. Especially as it costs all of us. The NHS is one of our biggest expenses and the only way people seem to think we can fix it is by throwing more money we don’t have at it. We must prevent ill health where we can. Reduce your expenditure.

As several PP have noted, rejoining the single market would be the single best thing we could do to boost our ailing economy.

Brexit has (so far) cost the UK economy about £200 billion. So no wonder we're in dire straits. Even The Telegraph are now publishing pieces about how 'Project Fear' was right all along.

And yes, over a decade of Tory rule has of course also been a huge factor. I can't wait for a GE and loads of Tory MPs who have inflicted this nightmare on us to lose their jobs.

I've said this before, but we are all only a few pay checks away from homelessness. Only the 1% have some buffer, but even they can lose everything through bad investment. (Downton Abbey springs to mind).

@Dibbydoos although I know this applies to most people…it does not apply to ALL. Those that own their own home outright are untouchable in a sense. Plenty of them around, more than we think.

We have had over a decade of slashing public spending, cutting taxes (mainly for the rich

They haven’t cut taxes in the last decade. Thresholds haven’t even been moved. What are you on about?

If you wish to dispute something, please read the whole of my post and dispute it all. Not a short partial clipping from one sentence. If you think that income tax is the only form of taxation, or the only way of reducing personal tax bills, then you really don't understand economics or reality. Or did you miss the fact that a certain someone probably about to become PM has a wife in this country who pays next to no taxes?

I think there can be misconceptions about how much help lower income families actually get. Our income is around £25k a year. DP works full time and I work part time. We have a mortgage (shared ownership) so no help with housing costs. The benefits we receive add up to £1600 a year. I'd much rather we didn't claim it and were paid more but our employers aren't suddenly going to pay us more.

The irony is that we are taking all the overtime we can get (dp is working a 12 and a half hour shift today for example) and we will probably have to give the £550 tax credit we will get this year back.

@Lauren1983 UC can help with the rent portion of the property if eligible.Do a benefits calculator check.

@AchillesLastStand precisely. Exactly right. Why can't people see this ?

We have no fucking trade deals. The one withNew Zealand is actually costing us money. The right of the Tory Party are refusing to do one with India because it entails movement of Labour, most trade deals do. The US won’t do a deal with us until we’ve sorted the Northern Ireland Protocol. How can we be economically successful asa country when no one will trade with us?

What taxes are you alleging have been cut?

it’s not true that Rishi Sunaks wife pays “next to no taxes”. I understand she is now domiciled in the uK but even before that she would only not be liable (as non domiciled individual) for uK tax on income from outside the uK. Her uK income would always be subject to uK tax. She has always paid tax in India on her Indian income as I understand it.

You know it’s possible to have a discussion without being a nasty arse about it right? I DID read your stupid comment. I’ll dispute whatever part I fucking want ok. YOU ARE WRONG.

are you ok?

it's not even midday & to be that stressed! 😆

She has always paid tax in India on her Indian income as I understand it.

Yes, and now India has less because of the reaction to that.

@bercan I’m good, are you?

The older I get, and I’m retired, the more it’s apparent that ‘the system’ doesn’t work. Post war, there was plenty of work in factories and the nation produced a huge amount of things which the rest of the world wanted. For a variety of reasons, not least Thatcher’s determination to destroy the unions, successive governments have embraced the ideology of globalization and light touch regulation. Now we have an economy which is about ‘financial services’ and dominated by activity in the City of London. The SE has seen growth, but the rest of the UK (bar some isolated pockets of wealth) has struggled and part of the struggle is the failure to tax fairly and squarely, the very rich including corporations. For far too long, the rules have been deliberately designed to benefit the very rich, be it the use of ‘non-dom’ status or the use of secretive trusts, contrived off shore arrangements and the use of off the shelf companies, to hide monies. The tax burden is heaviest on those who are not rich. It is lightest for those at the top who are most able to pay. Until ‘we’ insist on a fairer tax system and stop pretending that “small government: low taxes” improves our society, the squeeze will continue. Very rich people can bypass all of the things funded by the state. They don’t need a good Public Health Service, good state schools, libraries, geriatric care facilities and a functioning transport system. These same people/corporations don’t need a functioning robust parliamentary democracy, their influence is bought using lobbyists and donating to its party of choice. Does the economy exist to benefit the nation or is it the other way round?

@ILoveAllRainbowsx its bot insane , those people have also paid in and its not like goverments for the last 30 years have not had time to prepare
If you pay NI towards a pension maybe a small part should of been put into a pot go go towards future pensions
Its not like we didn't know we would all potentially start living longer also some of these rich so called pensioners will pay tax as well if they have a private income so are still paying into the system
My nan has a very small private pension but this then puts her just above the tax rate so she pays a small amount of tax as well , so living on about £15-160000 a year , no benefits other than single person c tax discount
Anyone who has paid in deserves to be paid out wether they have £150000 annual income or £1500000

We are on tax credits not UC as I'm concerned about the 6 weeks (iirc) migration wait plus I don't work set hours which confuses things. I will take a look though thank you.

If you pay NI towards a pension maybe a small part should of been put into a pot go go towards future pensions

you can't really decide that in retrospect. It wasn't predicted that people life expectancy would increase so much but healthy life expectancy wouldn't or how birth rates would plummet.