Rough' tax rises on the way

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What does this even mean? I can't take much more. Not with the rising energy prices and the absolute mess up of the mortgage interest rates rising.

How will people survive? Already we have not had pay rises and now we will all probably be taxed more.

I feel at the end of my tether. It's really affecting my mental health.

I can’t see how anything BUT tax increases will get us out of this. Labour would increase them too. And rightly IMO. If Labour thinks there’s a way out of this mess then they’re free to share and Rishi is centrist enough to appropriate any good ideas. I hope.

I'm a bit worried about the planned changes to childcare funding...the proposed £2000 per family doesn't sound like it'll go as far as the 30 free hours.

The government could close tax loopholes so they can't do this. It just doesn't want to. I agree with much of the above about the amount of wasted money during lockdown. Can we add the billions spent on a mostly useless vaccine to that list.

If Labour thinks there’s a way out of this mess then they’re free to share

And help the Tories stay in power? They’re better advised to keep their ideas to themselves until a GE is called.

There should have been far more checks and restrictions on Furlough - why were multi million/billion companies subbed even when their businesses were booming for example? So many companies automatically just put their workers on furlough despite having millions/billions in the pot themselves!

Also, billions was given out in business 'loans' that will never be recovered due to fraud and people taking the loans using them on home improvements or whatever and then going bankrupt. Again there were no proper checks. It's eye opening yet seems to have been brushed under the carpet. Imagine if Corbyn had got in power and done this ... there'd be absolute outrage by the tabloid press!

www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jun/06/covid-bounce-back-loans-paid-for-cars-watches-and-even-porn

This mess isn't on Labour, its on the Tories, 12 years of Austerity and still going, its certainly not on Labour to assist Sunak.
Tories are smaller state, less Govt, this why we are where we are plus some terrible decisions and 10s of billions poured down the drain.

Sure there is global events etc but its the UK that the markets are wary off, our borrowing costs are still double that of Germany's and a 1/3rd higher than France.

As for Sunak being a centralist? he is a hardcore Brexitier & is from the right of the party.

Yep especially first part

There is plenty of money out there. Just add up the house and car prices on your street and you will be in mega millions. Millions of streets. They should put the higher rate of tax up to 60-70% like in Belgium.

Another glib punter with a short memory. Give me a break.

If the Govt had delayed or withheld furlough payments and business loans to allow detailed means testing (a massive and probably impossible job which would have costed more than it saved - how exactly can anyone tell confidently whose business is really “booming” until they have published audited accounts - which takes months even when you aren’t in mid-pandemic) then you would have been complaining that the Government was oblivious to the plight of workers being made redundant in their tens of thousands, families going starving and thousands of businesses going to the wall.

Pursue the fraudsters after the fact by all means. Lock em up, and shame the big companies into giving back the money, as some have done.

But don’t sit there and LIE about what you would have said at the time if the Government had acted differently.

I don’t think anything can save the Tories at the next election - surely most Labour voters don’t want to see the UK struggle more than necessary for years just to get one over on people who largely won’t be affected due to their wealth - it would be screwing the more vulnerable?

The conservatives just won’t win - at best they can hope for a coalition but if Labour present some good ideas for fiscal management they can remind everyone at GE time they came up with them.

If they were booming they most likely required staff to meet the demand.

Furlough was for a drop in demand. Which companies are you talking about specifically?

So depressing.

Most people in the UK supported furlough and the covid measures. I am in the 9% of the UK who did not even have one vaccine and was against all the measures such as furlough since March 2020 as did not want us burdened for a generation. However I accept most Western Governments did the same so there was nothing special about the wastage in the UK - US also had big furlough frauds. We are where we are. I would like much lower taxes and a small state but I am shouting into the wind about that as no party supports it.

Genuine question - if the Tories are keeping the triple lock because they believe that pensioners are their core voters what is their plan for when the pensioners die off?

Seriously? Belgium? The country with one of the highest rates of tax avoidance in Europe? Which offers massive tax exemptions and perks to big companies and expats? Whose economy would be toast without the billions of tax exempt EU cash spent in Brussels?

Yeah, let’s try that.

Haven't RTFT but I just hope (pointlessly) that the taxes are targeted at the highest earners. All that clapping for nhs, carers, teachers, binmen... well now it's payback time for the people who went out to work every day while rich people sat at home. But let's be honest, the shitshow we're in now is largely thanks to Brexit.

Apparently people get more conservative as they get older. There will always be more pensioners.

I'm talking about millionaires (2.4m in the UK) & corporations like Amazon

I know you are, walkinginsunshinekat; trouble is, these are exactly the people who can best afford expert tax planning, some of it from Treasury staff themselves

I'm no apologist for tax evasion, but I wouldn''t blame anyone for tax avoidance within the rules, and unlike government who are a net cost at least Amazon and the like are producing something, even if it's just PAYE from all their employees

Increase tax on earnings over £100k

You’ll all start screaming but I’m for it

I was specifically talking about energy support, i m not quite sure that comes under tax avoidance!

But how do other countries manage to have higher taxes on the wealthy?

How did the UK manage, prior to Thatcher?

Is the UK a "special case" ?

Just watchinh Sky and how Academy Schools are having to step in to support parents who cannot afford to get their kids to school/feed and cloth them/energy costs.

Its quite incredible, Victorian era - meanwhile our PM, has a combined wealth of 720m and will get reduced electricity for his new pool.

I just do not get why tax payers on avg earnings should paying for this.

I was specifically talking about energy support, i m not quite sure that comes under tax avoidance!

Apologies, walkinginsunshinekat - entirely my fault for not twigging that bit, and I agree completely on it

On the wider point about checks being made though, while it chokes me to say it, in fairness there wasn't time with the hysteria in full flow and many calling the government murderers if they didn't (insert demand)

However all that said I'm not convinced it would have made any difference if they'd had the time between now and hell freezing over, because in my long experience there's neither the will nor the capability when it comes to other people's money - and no proper accountability either, which is largely how we came to be in this mess

Taxing the average worker more is pure insanity when people are already struggling with utility bills and mortgages rates.

The government has so far chosen not to tax energy companies and the richest in society. MPs are also getting all their expenses paid, subsidised rents, subsidised meals and so on. That's who they should be targeting.

The government wasted millions on useless PPE, track and trace and other stupid projects like the ridiculous idea of paying Rwanda millions to take on asylum seekers.

So basically they are wasting our tax money anyway and failing to tax the wealthiest.

The only positive in this is that the Sunak government will just finish the Tories forever.

Basic checks should have been implemented to prevent fraud. The fact is people pressed a button and were given 50k no questions asked...it was in their accounts within 24 hours! This included businesses that had never made 50k or anywhere near that! Loans were given to people who set up businesses after the bounce back scheme started! Once fraudsters realised how easy it was they were laughing all the way to the bank all at our expense!

"criminal gangs were exploiting the system. They stole the identities of real people, set up fake companies and claimed the maximum £50,000."

"The Department for Business estimated fraudulent loans were worth £4.9bn, 11% of the total, as of March."

www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-59504943

Plus there will be many businesses who go bankrupt and won't ever be able to repay the loans.

www.ft.com/content/37dad961-6582-45bf-8bc6-4dd5f934cba8

It was test and trace, not track and trace. Test and trace paid for providing and processing all of the millions of covid tests being done every day. There were people on MN doing several LFTs per day, and repeated PCR tests for a few days if the result was negative, but they felt ill. Multiply that by 70 million people, and it will/did cost billions.

@Capri3 ''It was test and trace, not track and trace.''

Talk about focusing on what matters...let's forget about the cost of living crisis and focus on a typo.

Pedants' and clueless corner.