Angela Rayner’s bombshell leaked memo that allegedly called on Rachel Reeves to make a raft of bold changes ahead of her Spring Statement, also reportedly pushed for middle class families to lose a key benefit. Rayner, the Deputy PM and Housing Secretary, was accused of straying from her brief as she and her team suggested Reeves should consider various measures instead of spending cuts, including a string of wealth tax rises, according to a document seen by The Telegraph.
They also reportedly suggested the idea of making it more difficult for immigrants to get Universal Credit welfare payments and to raise the fee which has to be paid to use the NHS, the newspaper claims. It’s now reporting that same memo also urged the Treasury to “claw back” child benefit payments from households where the highest earner was on between £50,000 and £80,000. Express.co.uk has not seen the document.
Under the current rules, parents can £26.05 per week – or £1,345.60 per year – for the eldest or only child.
Parents get £17.25 per week for any additional children which amounts to £897 per year, though rules mean some high earners aren’t able to claim it.
Parents can claim £1,355 a year in child benefit for a first child and £897 a year for any additional child.
Changes to the rules made under former Chancellor Jeremy Hunt, where are still currently in place, mean when the high earner has an income of between £60,000 and £80,000, they are subject to the High Income Child Benefit Charge.
If earnings rise above £80,000 they then lose the benefit entirely.
Hunt warned the Labour government against changing the current threshold, telling the paper: “This may look like a relatively minor budget measure but was one of the most popular things we did because it helped striving middle-class families struggling with childcare costs.
“Abandoning them would finally confirm that far from being a New Labour government, this is a traditional anti-aspiration Old Labour government,” he added.
Rayner and her team’s memo set out “ten proposals that would be popular, prudent, and would not raise taxes on working people”.
It added: “There are also some more radical and new proposals that may be more difficult to implement and/or contentious – but which would be worthy of careful consideration.”
