Post your questions for Rachel Reeves, Chancellor of the Exchequer

[JustineMumsnet]

Hi all,
Next week we’ll be back in Westminster to put your questions to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rachel Reeves MP.
If there’s something you’d like me to ask her - from the big economic picture to how the cost of living is affecting families (or anything else) - then please post your question below.

As ever, one question per user please, and keep it civil. We’ll be tight on time, so short, focused questions will help us get through as many as possible.

We’ll close the thread early on Sunday evening, so please do get your questions in before then. We’ll be back soon with her responses.

Thanks,
Justine

You plan a flat rate cap on NIC savings from salary sacrifice pension contributions in 2029, to tackle higher earners squirrelling away thousands in their pensions. But this will impact people earning from around £40K plus. I’m a private sector 50-something higher rate tax payer (who does not earn 6 figures), who contributes 13% to her pension because I couldn’t afford to pay in a private pension in my 20s, and I don’t have a defined benefit pension to rely on. I appreciate that I am lucky I can afford to do that now, but I’m only trying to make up for lost years of contributions. This policy will disproportionately affect private sector workers (who make up the majority of scheme members as public sector employees are more likely to have a defined benefit pension so salary sacrifice isn’t a factor), who already don’t have enough in their pension pots. My company passes the NIC savings to my pension, so it’s a significant hit and the policy makes it harder for me to save enough for my retirement. Wouldn’t it be fairer to apply a reasonable cap on the percentage of earnings you can salary sacrifice (across all schemes including EV cars and bikes), bring back the lifetime allowance and/or reduce the amount of pension contributions very high earners get tax relief on, rather than hitting the pension contributions of middle earners with a flat rate?

Have you also considered that many more PAYE employees will need to apply for tax relief on their pension contributions as this is only applied at the basic rate at source, thus more claims for HMRC to administer?

Yes, 💯

This goes to the question asked by another poster on the thread about the NHS pissing away £££millions of taxpayers’ money on defending their own unlawful policies, eg the Darlington nurses case, and employing expensive DEI administrative managers to impose and maintain such unlawful policies and practices.

It’s fiscally wasteful and ethically wrong.

ETA: it was @borntobequiet.

Have you considered extending employees NIC beyond pension age?

This is a great Q… and don’t say we cut fuel bills £150. It’s a pittance and more than offset by rises elsewhere. Labour aren’t working for working families.

Sorry Rachel, zero faith in your ability based on last 2 years and wouldn’t employ you or work for you let alone have you in charge of growing our economy which we know won’t happen.

People have had enough. Been no let up since 2008.

Why aren't you nationalising the useless utility companies? Especially the water companies.

Don’t say breakfast clubs either.

I’m so sick of hearing about breakfast clubs.

Why do you hate business and successful people?

YES stop talking about breakfast clubs. 99.9% are private and you pay.

Or there’s a sizeable top-up required.

Like ‘free’ nursery places.

I agree that this is extremely unfair. My elderly neighbour spent most of his final year as an in-patient in a NHS hospital due to cancer and kidney disease. His family did not have to pay for his care (quite rightly, in my opinion). Yet, if his illness had been dementia, they would have been looking at a bill of at least £50,000.

I work in recruitment so see the employment landscape in grave detail. Why have you disincentivised employing people through the workers rights act, increased ENICs and increased NMW? Do you have any idea what a mess you've created?

Jobs are down while benefits are up. Classic Labour.

Is it true benefit payments are more than income tax receipts ?
What are you doing about fuel duty ?

How are you helping people get jobs ?

Given that the UK’s private sector has largely transitioned away from defined benefit (DB) pension schemes to defined contribution (DC) arrangements over the past two decades—particularly since the early 2000s, when rising costs and regulatory pressures led to widespread DB scheme closures—why does the government continue to provide predominantly defined benefit pensions to public sector employees?
Data from the Institute for Government confirms that most public sector workers remain enrolled in DB schemes that guarantee an income based on salary and years of service, often on an unfunded, pay-as-you-go basis through current taxation.
In contrast, the private sector has seen a sustained decline in DB provision, with schemes closing to new members and future accrual—falling to just around 4% open to accrual by 2023—while DC schemes, where retirement income depends on investment performance, have become the norm.
Furthermore, research from the Institute for Fiscal Studies shows that pension accrual is significantly more generous in the public sector, with the gap widening during the early 2000s as private employers shifted to less costly DC models.

With public sector DB schemes covering nearly 20 million members and with long-term public pension liabilities estimated in the trillions of pounds, how does the government justify maintaining this structural disparity between sectors?
Specifically:

• What is the policy rationale for retaining DB pensions in the public sector despite their decline in the private sector?
• How does the government assess the long-term fiscal sustainability of these schemes?
• And does the government consider this divergence equitable for taxpayers, the majority of whom now rely on defined contribution pensions?

How do you anticipate the War in the Middle East and Ukraine will impact on your economic policies going forward ?

Are you worried that the growth you are creating is just in Government spending and the actual private sector that pays for it is getting smaller?

When are you going to come up with a proper financial plan for the country?
Slash the debt and in time lower taxes.
Debts and money management is the most basic of maths

Why is it a disadvantage to work nowadays? I work full time and have done all my life, yet every pay increase goes on more taxes. The fuel costs rocketing which increases profits for the government , food, council tax, car tax. Due to the freeze on earnings limits I can’t even work any overtime I’m offered as the extra money would be taxed so every pay increase is now in effect a pay cut.

Why are you letting looney Ed dictate energy policy? We have an oil crisis, if only we could tap into our own resources like I dunno the North Sea!?

Why do you give so many vacuous soundbites? The voters are not as daft as you think. We are however sick of platitudes about how you understand things are tough… we want action, not least as sympathy is between sh*t & syphilis in the dictionary.

Why do you blame every failure on outside events? Surely the key for Chancellor is to foresee and manage risk?

What exactly are you going to do for working families who rent or have a mortgage to pay but who are often more cash poor than comparators not working not least as we get no help whatsoever?

Worst government I can remember and we’ve had many!

Why is state pension not means tested in this country? In almost every other developed nation, retirement benefits are means tested, which means that a more generous pension can be paid to those who actually need it, rather than wealthy self-funded retirees.

Why do you feel it fair to marginalise people with disabilities still further. How are you justifying the decreases in their benefits?

Dear Chancellor,

If I acquire £50,000 through working, I pay about £15,000 of it back in tax.
If I acquire £50,000 through my assets rising in value, I pay much less back in tax.
If I acquire £50,000 through inheritance, I pay nothing back in tax at all.

Do you agree that this is completely the wrong way round, and if so what will you do so that people can obtain financial security from working rather than just being lucky and inheriting?

Best Q yet.

As a taxpayer I resent my money being wasted on harassing women who dont want to undress in the presence of men. Why does the government allow resources to be wasted on pandering to the demands of men pretending to be women? I want to be able to vote Labour again but I stopped when it became clear that the party was deeply misogynistic.

The Music and Dance Scheme is designed so that exceptionally talented children can attend music or dance schools based on what their families can afford. How can you justify a 20% VAT increase on top of what families have been assessed as being able to afford, which is now forcing some of those children to give up their potential careers?

The Labour Party says it wants to widen access to the arts but has now priced talented children out of being able to access the training they need to have a career in the arts. Other countries have fully funded state ballet or music schools while the Labour Party is taxing low income families at 20% more than they can objectively afford. Why are children on MDS schemes not exempted from the 20% VAT?