To think scrapping inheritance tax would not be popular with voters

[Lanadelday]

I'd say I can't believe the conservatives are considering it, but nothing surprises me any more that they do. But AIBU to think most people wouldn't back this anyway- I can't see it being a big vote winner and don't think they really get that voters are sick of all the inequality and so many people including kids and elderly, living in poverty, not wanting to make it worse.

For those saying they have already paid tax on these houses then that’s not true for the vast majority. The value of lots of houses has increased by vast amounts without any work. The increased value has not been taxed at all. Maybe if they took away the initial cost of the house plus the interest paid from the total and tax the rest with Inheritance tax.
We all pay tax with money that has already been taxed. VAT, tax on petrol, road tax, council tax we all use our taxed income to pay these extra taxes so why should houses be any different.

Maybe they should tighten up some of the rules around it or make Captial Gains tax via property the same rate as Inheritance tax to stop people gifting it to their children before death.

agree with that point, other taxes should be far more in line with income.

but we have a lot of divorces/separations these days which means that many of the "children" inhertiting a £1M property (for example) will only get one £325K exemption. It's not necessarily the case that both divorced parents are wealthy enough to trigger IHT.

Everyone with an estate including a property has a £500k exemption, the benefit for a couple is the roll over. So the estate of a single person consisting of a £1 million house would pay the heirs £800k after tax.

You pay 40% on anything over £325k don't you? Which I understand can be effectively 500k since the government introduced an extra allowance in 2017.

But my point is that husbands and wives can pass on property to each other with no IHT to pay and people say on these threads that the 325k allowance (or 500k effecively) can be combined upon the death of the second parent. But that won't be the case if the parents are divorced so not leaving property to one another before it eventually ends up being inherited by the children.

That’s what I said. 🤷‍♀️

"It's not selfish to want to pass stuff on to your kids"

Surely that's the very definition of selfish. Wanting to prioritise your own kids at the expense of everyone else's that would benefit from the tax paid. The law gives reasonable provision (£325k) to pass on heirlooms etc.

I'm not sure because you want to pass money on to your kids that is a good justification to make money passed onto your kids free of taxation. Should I be able to pass a proportion of my income onto my kids income tax free because I'm giving it to my kids ? Where does that end ?

The bottom line is if we want better services we have to pay for that through taxation. The taxation of people who are dead and therefore have benefited from society and no longer need the money seems like a good way to raise more tax, rather than taxing young families who are struggling to afford mortgages and the cost of living into exhaustion.

I'd like to see death duties raised much higher and be unavoidable and income tax lowered in compensation.

@IsGoodIsDon its not about the value though, is it?
We paid just over £120,000 for our house, 26 years ago, borrowing £70,000 (3 * combined fairly average wages) and putting in our deposit plus a value increase from our previous property.
We both gained promotions over the years at our places of work, but realised 10 years ago that even with the (very much) increased salaries we were on then, we would be unlikely to be able to think of up-sizing to a better 3-bed or 4-bed property in our area.
Our property is our home, not just “an asset”. Why should there be no IHT on similar (or bigger) properties in other areas. We didn’t choose to live here because of the property price rises, and couldn’t have foreseen that in the time we have lived here that the prices would increase by over 700%.
If our house was revalued tomorrow at £250,000, it would be worth the same to us as it is now at nearly £900,000 and our DC would be able to live in it - now that is what isn’t fair!

It's a voluntary tax. Anyone with serious wealth is clued up enough to have made arrangements to avoid it.

If you (well, your estate) pay it, it's because you just tripped over the limit.

Given that the limit will catch every homeowner in London and the SE and a large number elsewhere, I would say that abolishing it would be amazingly popular.

Frankly, if the Tories offer it, I would have to think VERY carefully how I voted in the next general election.

It doesn't catch every home owner in London

It catches their children

the limit will catch every homeowner in London and the SE and a large number elsewhere

Of course it won’t. It’s utterly ridiculous to think that there are no houses in London and the Home Counties worth less than £1 million. The facts don’t support that assertion.

A whopping one in 40 U.K. homeowners are now property millionaires, a result of the pandemic-induced home-buying boom, according to a report Wednesday from Savills.

There are now 730,390 homes valued at £1 million (US$1.21 million) or more across the U.K., equating to 2.5% of all housing stock, the real estate agency said.

That's why it's such a great policy for the Tories.

It appeals to the champagne socialist/floating voter.

In fact it is so vote winning and little cost that I am pretty much 100% confident that if the Tories offer it Labour will steal the policy and be forced to offer the same, or at least something similar.

I think it is taxing the dead

The best ones to tax I’d have thought 😀

If Labour were to steal it they’d lose as many, if not more, votes than they won.

You won't pay IHT on your £900k house left to your children. It's exempt, as has been explained many times!

@GasPanic it's not at the expense of everyone else's kids tho is it, it's at the expense of those who parents haven't earned the money or in fact any money.

Any increase in tax never seems to go the middle it always goes to the bottom. It's like keeping the triple lock, on paper that's great it increases state pension but actually those who in the middle who have worked for pensions are just taxed more on their private pensions so see very little of the increase.

Say we put in a 1% tax for schools funding that would then be distributed to the poorest schools first despite the fact it would be us in the middle paying it!

We have a very warped view of adult children in this country we seem to think at 18 we have to disassociate them from their parents instead of families remaining as one unit. At the end of the day DS is our flesh and blood he will and should get everything. All IHT does is leave us with an accountants bill and foreign property held in trust.

Would they? It’s an unpopular tax even with Labour voters, with only a third considering it to be fair.

Of that third, how many of those are loathe to vote for Starmer anyway? He’s deeply disliked already by a left wing section of the party, who consider him to be a red Tory for his pro-business position. Starmer is of course aware of this, so is he going to be overly concerned with alienating the already alienated?

The Conservatives don’t need to win the election, they just need to swing enough votes from Labour to force a coalition. Starmer has to consider his options tbh.

Some people just can’t stop themselves, can they.
away and twitch your net curtains.

You are pathologising normal parental instincts and in effect saying money should go to the state as super-parent instead. People can have good reasons for disagreeing with this which are not about “selfishness”.

Thank you, but your permission is not required 😂

It catches their children but homeowners will go to great lengths to prevent their children from having to pay tax that can be avoided with some forward planning.

I feel ambivalent about it myself because I value public services but dislike paying high amounts of tax. You can't get one without the other which is a contradiction I am at least aware of. Many people don't even seem to see the link between the two.

Anyone that agrees with inheritance is pure evil!
It is a myth that only the rich will benefit if it is scrapped.

The Royal Family anyone? They don't pay, and I bet other super wealthy people don't either.
The fact is it mostly effects hard working middle of the road people. Anyone that is jealous that a modest house isn't being taxed into oblivion after some old couple that have worked hard all their lives want their property to be passed down, to their children and grandchildren without penalty, need to take a long hard look at to how they have lived their life. It is disgusting that some people think this is just!

Anyone that is jealous that a modest house isn't being taxed into oblivion after some old couple that have worked hard all their lives want their property to be passed down, to their children and grandchildren without penalty, need to take a long hard look at to how they have lived their life.

We’re that “old couple” and we support inheritance tax and could easily have an estate liable for it. Still think we’re evil? Modest houses belonging to hardworking old couples aren’t generally in estates liable for inheritance tax.

Some countries have managed to draw very good tax receipts by being more competitive

I envy that. We seem to be stuck in the won’t vote for it cycle.

No one gets to bail out using the excuse of "normal parental instincts".

Because if me and mine are the priority to the exclusion of all else, the justifications for supporting me and mine never end.

And if it is like that for one individual, it should be like that for everyone else, which basically reverts to everyone looking after their own interests.

I don’t feel very strongly about IHT … but my Mum really does. She has no faith that anyone in government will do anything sensible with any money from her estate. It isn’t entirely rational but it probably will be a vote winner - at least with older people in the Home Counties.