A 1p / 2p raise to income tax should lawfully trigger a general election

[TesChique]

There are vague promises in manifestos, and there are those which are explicit and should be binding except in exceptional circumstances (war etc)

If labour, or any party reneges on a core manifesto promise it should lawfully trigger a general election

They have lied to the public.

AIBU to think we need to see this change in law?

I’d be happy to pay more income tax if it’s still needed when we’ve stopped pissing £billions on accommodation for asylum seekers. Either give them asylum so they can work and pay tax or deport them.
If I was in charge I’d raise the tax threshold from £K12ish to £K20. That would allow people do spend more and so increase income from VAT and create more jobs selling and making the stuff we buy.

Pensioners, on the whole, are not living in anything near poverty

So you are happy to penalise the ones that are near poverty if they do increase taxes

If this happens, the public need to teach Labour an immediate lesson. General election now.

Let’s see how Labour are pissing taxpayer money up the wall,

They decided to give Chagos islands away and £35b of our money with it. Thats right Mauritius is able to give it own people a tax cut because we paying for it.

There are 1000 people a day going onto drivability benefits a day. Thats right 1000 people a day. And they could cut £5n over 5 years. Over 10 million people are now claiming benefits. There seems to be no end to the amount of freebies that you can get on benefits. And yes, notability cars for ADHD is a thing. In fact a quarter of all new leasehold cars are now motability. Taxpayer buying cars for benefits claimants while how many not on benefits can afford new cars?

The country is spending £2m a day, yes a day, on asyulm seekers. Two Tier was supposed to stop the boats, the arrivals have sky rocketed under him.

This Labour government has taken waste of taxpayer’s cash to another level. Angela Rayner, who is now thankfully booted out, and her housing department spent millions in overseas flights in less than a year. And the number of houses built by Labour, in this country, fell.

Billions are being stolen in the name of net 0. This government is handing out cash to its cronies like smarties while bill payers pay he highest electricity costs in the world. Double whammy, we pay for this mafia through taxes and then again through energy bills.

There are over half a million civil servants leeching off the taxpayer, a massive increase in the last few years. Can anyone see what value they are adding. At least we are all adding value to them, they spend nearly a billion quid a year on takeaways, entertainment and hospitality. Great, isn’t it.

At this point, this government is just laughing at us. They are trolling us while stealing from us. And taxes are about to go up even more.

Just better would be great, I assume you voted Labour last time and got the budget which means more taxes are needed now. All your laughing emojis won’t help them now.

Go for it with the Greens. The markets would give you a day if they ever got close.

If you’re only going to be paying a couple of hundred more in tax per year, the you have nothing to be annoyed about. You are probably not a net contributor and are taking more from the system than they you are paying in. Your taxes are not going to make any difference.

1p isn’t really that much. We need better services . Everyone whinges. Farmers, house owners, landlords, the money has to come from somewhere.

We need better and stronger politicians who know what they are doing. Trouble is there are none around.

A manifesto is a declaration of aims and intentions. Don’t be ridiculous.

Business are bankrupt. People are squeezed. It can’t go on. We are a laughing stock of the world.

Why do you think the rest of the world cares about what Britain is doing? We’re just a little island.

The cliff edges (CB / tax free childcare etc) need to go as well as they drive entirely personally sensible behaviour where people cut their hours but they hamper growth

@LittleBearPad agree with this. I know a few people who are fit and healthy, but only work 2 days per week as they'd lose benefits otherwise. I don't really blame them and view it as no different from eg paying into a pension to reduce higher rate income tax ie legitimately "working the system" but it doesn't seem like something that should be encouraged

All parties lie and break promises. There are all the same in that regard.

All parties lie and break promises. There are all the same in that regard.

Over half of everything that’s is spent is through taxes and borrowing. Just think about that. Actually sorry, silly comment, most people here probably don’t understand what the means, they think the money appears magically.

But the small minority that do understand it, just think about that. Eventually we’ll run out of people who are actually net contributors. You can’t spend taxes you don’t have. This is beyond a disaster.

You’re living in the clouds if you think any party could ‘fix’ the economic challenges. Get a Time Machine back to 2019 perhaps. Brexit will always, always be the problem.

Can you explain that or is it just something you are repeating because you heard it on the tv.

Brexit is not even half the reason why this is happening.

I agree there are really hard choices to make. I think the priority needs to be setting up future generations for the incredibly difficult task they’re going to have, of propping up an aging society. Child poverty- and welfare structures based around eradicating it- have to be the priority, however you feel about the “worthiness” of parent claimants. We cannot expect a generation of children which were abandoned to rot in intergenerational cycles of deprivation, to then step up and carry us in old age, socially, economically or otherwise. I think it’s beyond question now that radical pension reform- and hand in hand with it the establishment of a National Social Care Service is vital. Just not sure that any govt will have the balls to do it.

It will take longer than a day to enact that policy. And the markets wouldn’t have much choice if they were an elected government.

Also, l asked you for your idea. Which you haven’t answered.

Very apt.

The country was fucked by the Tories…..
Who had no choice but to impose austerity due to the reckless spending of the previous Labour government.
Add in COVID, Ukraine for starters and it was hardly surprising that there was a black hole. However, it is much larger now due to the reckless spending of the current Labour government. On and on they go, clueless, dishonest, a party who had 14 years to lay down some plans to improve but didn’t have a clue what to do when they were elected.

Don't be such a fanny. If we had a GE every time a governing party had to do something that wasn't in their election manifesto we'd be an an ungovernable basket case. Some people never paid attention in Civics and it shows.

They repeatedly promised they wouldn’t be increasing taxes on working people during their election campaign and their MPs kept trotting out the line “all our plans are fully costed”. I knew it was absolute bollocks, which is why I didn’t vote for them. And I knew they would conveniently find a hole in the budget that they would blame on the Tories and blame them for increasing taxes - I remember telling my husband it would happen.

Reeves said the tax increases imposed in her last budget would be a one off, but since they won the election, the gap in the budget has magically grown from £22bn, to over £50bn.

They are completely out of their depth and they need to go.

At the best guess, Brexit has cost the economy approximately 100bn a year. 5% of the economy (though this is ofc contested). John Springford’s analysis - CER think tank- is considered as good as it can be, given the number of variables - and that’s roughly where he comes out.

Thats not nothing, is it?

Brexit was the most enormous act of self harm. And has achieved nothing except made us look foolish, irrelevant, and relatively friendless, in a world where we desperately all need friends.

No point raising taxes unless waste and profligacy is dealt with. It's just throwing more money in to a bottomless pit. The NHS and Welfare needs sorting out. Currently no Party has the balls to take that on.

The economy needs to be grown aggressively, this Chancellor doesn't seem to understand that. It's the private sector that will dig the Country out of the state it is in, but not with current policies.

I think if they raise tax without addressing the welfare bill they are going to struggle to sell that to people to be honest.

As long as it is 1 or 2p on everyone that is fair. .

It does make me laugh though when people say Reform haven't costed their plan properly. Remember Starmer and Reeves had "costed" this one "no ifs, no buts", and have already now come back for two large tax rises.

Public sector borrowing as a percentage of GDP isn't that high. It's current the 4th highest year in the last decade. And well below the post war average and lower than the mid 1990s.

We're not in a debt crisis.
UK Bond yields aren't doing anything particularly different from several other developed economies where yields are highest since the late 1990s.

I'm not saying the current economic situation is ideal but also that there is no grounds for scare mongering - beyond hoping this will drive people to vote for Reform whose economic illiteracy will make Liz Truss look competent.