If Labour raises taxes what will you think?

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Typing on my phone so not sure I can do a poll? But, if the government raises income tax or NI at the budget, will you think:

A - let’s get real, they had no other choice
B - those duplicitous / inept bastards

Looking into where wastage occurs requires effort. Whereas increasing taxes requires no effort.

So, governments take the easy route and increase taxes as their high salaries and perks means they wont feel it as much as those on low wages.

There was apparently huge wastage in local authorities according to Reform. They promised to eliminate it all and cut council tax in the councils they now run. Well, what a surprise - they couldn’t find any of the alleged waste and are increasing council tax by the maximum permitted. Of course if some people didn’t hide their money away and paid their fair share taxes could fall for all of us.

I’m no fan of Reform, but I admit to being slightly surprised they couldn’t find wastage. Looking at some of the things our local council do and the way they do it I would definitely think there are some efficiency savings to be made - but perhaps this is such a small part of their overall budget that it doesn’t make a difference.

Most of the wastage is statutory requirement from central government. Ridiculously long tax-payer funded taxi journeys for school kids etc.

Benefits and entitlements need to be changed by central government, in order to stop our money being flushed down the drain increasingly fast. Labour won't do it. Things will be pretty dire by the time the country gets another chance to vote.

if some people didn’t hide their money away and paid their fair share taxes could fall for all of us.

Hmm... I wonder why people feel the need to minimise the tax they pay.🤔

As Labour continue their over-reach and tax take goes down as people change their behaviour - and the economy stalls - you will certainly find that you need to pay more tax for less.

Higher income people are already paying way, way more than their 'fair share' and there's only so much you can steal from them before they stop.

@Blossomtoes

Of course if some people didn’t hide their money away and paid their fair share taxes could fall for all of us.

You mean people like Angela Rayner who attempted to avoid stamp duty and Rachel Reeves who didn’t want to pay £900 licence fee to rent out a house she owned.

@strawberrybubblegum

Higher income people are already paying way, way more than their 'fair share' and there's only so much you can steal from them before they stop.

Exactly. 11,000 millionaires left the UK in 2024 and the forecast for 2025 is 16,500. Even Tony Blair is against increasing taxes on the wealthy.

Examples of wastage I can think of:

HS2 project. Initial estimate £20 billion. Most recent estimate £100 billion.

Tramline in Edinburgh. £375 million for 20 miles. Final cost over £1 billion for 8.7 miles.

Those two examples alone are more the double the estimated black hole that Rachel Reeves claims is needed to be filled.

The tax rises are just to stop the deficit growing. There'll be no improvement in services as the funds raised won't increase public spending.

£40 to see a GP then?

It all comes down to the kind of country that we want to live in. Personally, I don't want to live in a country where health care is only for those who can afford it, and I'm happy to pay more tax in order to preserve the principle of health care that is free at the point of delivery.

Fair enough if you don't agree, but I think the majority of people in this country do still believe in the idea of the NHS. Time will tell, I suppose.

I do think that there are inefficiencies and savings that could be made, as in most large scale organisations. But I don't agree with your solution.

Unfortunately too many treat the NHS like a free vending machine. It costs us a fortune to run it - 11 or 12% of GDP.

That might be because almost two thirds of the population is overweight or obese and people fail to look after their own health. Obviously that leads to chronic health conditions.

Yes, it is expensive to run, but I think it's worth the investment.

And yes, maybe some people do take it for granted and use resources wastefully. But I would rather live with that than create a system in which healthcare was only available to those who could afford it. It's all about choices and priorities, isn't it?

Touché @GlobeTrotter2000

I think Wes Streeting is going in the right direction with a focus on preventative care. We need to keep investing in this, as that will save money in the longer term, as well as improving people's quality of life.

If someone would then just have the balls to sort out social care, things would be greatly improved.

This is why I think people need to be more financially invested in their health. To look after themselves better and treat the NHS with respect. And with 53.3% of all households taking more in benefits than they contribute in all taxes; too few are financially invested.

I think you mean 53.3% of households contributing less than they use. That includes all services, not just benefits. You only need to have a couple of kids in school for that to be the case or have a serious accident or illness. After being net contributors for most of our lives we tipped into that category when we claimed our state pensions and one of us got a cancer diagnosis. We have no choice in getting old or ill.

of course - around 90% of pensioners are net receivers - that’s to be expected.

The big change is the percentage of working age taking more than they give.

But the reality is, if we adopted your proposals, some people just wouldn't seek medical help because of the cost. A lot of families simply don't have a spare £40 to see the GP or £250 to go to A&E. Survival of the richest, rather than the fittest.

I would be open to the introduction of some sort of incentive scheme to encourage people to take more responsibility for managing their health proactively, but I'm absolutely not in favour of punitive measures or putting up barriers that would prevent poorer families from accessing health care. I think what you're suggesting would be totally inhumane, and like I said, that just isn't the kind of society that I want to live in.

I don’t think it is. If you’re healthy and don’t have children of school age you’re going to be a net contributor at a much lower level. As I’ve illustrated it changes with life stage.

it does change with life stages, but we also know that the percentage of non retired UK households receiving more in benefits and services has gone up from 29.5% in 1977 to 45.8% in 2024.

We didn’t subsidise low wages in 1977 so that’s a very poor comparison. A better comparison would be with 2003 when tax credits were introduced. At that point 2 million children were lifted out of poverty at a stroke. Paying people properly would eliminate it but then everyone who objects to paying taxes would be complaining about price rises and inflation - which, incidentally, was 16% in 1977.

In 2003 it was 36.3% of working age households.

www.ons.gov.uk/generator?uri=/peoplepopulationandcommunity/personalandhouseholdfinances/incomeandwealth/bulletins/theeffectsoftaxesandbenefitsonhouseholdincome/financialyearending2021/8a4a4e33&format=xls

I was a VC scout for six years, and that’s not entirely accurate.

Venture capital actually brings money into the UK. Over the past 10 years especially, a large share of investment in British start-ups comes from foreign funds, particularly American ones.

The asset class/industry grew massively during the ZIRP era (the Zero Interest Rate Phenomenon), because family offices, pension funds, and other institutional investors were desperate to find some form of yield.

The “problem” with VC (and how one could perceive it as taking money out of the UK) appears later, when it’s time for a start-up to scale and eventually exit (typically through an IPO or acquisition).

You see, VC operates on a power law — much like the music industry.

For every investment that goes to zero, you only need one or two runaway successes to return the entire fund (all capital deployed plus, say, 3%).

That’s why such a focus on unicorns - if your fund raised $200M to spread across a series of bets (startups) and one of them exists for $1B, you’re laughing.

Put another way: you only need one Taylor Swift or Coldplay to de-risk the bets you make on one-hit wonders.

The challenge for the UK is that it’s a small market with high taxes, high risk aversion, lots of regulation (albeit less than the EU) and, arguably, “tall poppy” syndrome.

So founders often sell early — usually to an American giant like Google (see: DeepMind) — or relocate abroad to scale and exit on more favourable terms.

VC money started drying up in 2023 (even American funds had to turn to the UAE and Saudi Arabia to raise new capital).

Last year’s budget didn’t help.

The government it increased Capital Gains Tax, tightened the rules for non-doms (who make up a VERY active segment of the UK angel investment community), and reduced Entrepreneurs’ Relief.

Together, those changes have made the UK less attractive for both investors and founders.

I know founders that have moved to the US and UAE because it’s too hard to raise money let alone scale here.

Ironically, as a fallout of capital flight (for lack of a better term), we’ve basically ripped the rug out from one of the few areas where the ecosystem was making real progress: closing the wealth and funding gap for women in business.

Over the past few years, a growing number of funds had been created specifically to back women founders and provide early-stage capital.

In fact, Akshata Sunak has been a prolific investor in women-founded startups building in sectors that couldn’t traditionally get VC or bank funding.

I would think that they've joined the Conservative party.