The depth of dread across the country about the tax hikes Rachel Reeves is expected to announce in the autumn Budget is exposed in grim new polling. Seven out of 10 Britons (71%) expect the overall level of tax will go up rises but just 32% believe the heavier taxation is necessary.
Reform UK voters are the most pessimistic about the Budget with 78% expecting Ms Reeves to hike up they pay personally pay. Pollsters YouGov found Conservatives voters also expect to take a greater tax hit (74%), compared with 52% of people who backed Labour anticipating paying more to the Treasury.
Reform UK deputy leader Richard Tice MP said: “Despite endless campaign promises not to raise taxes on working people, they broke that pledge immediately upon assuming office, and now are set to do so again. We face a population trapped on stagnant wages, unable to afford homes, and left with nothing to pass on to their children.
“With punishing taxation and the highest energy prices in the world, this situation is unsustainable.”
There is deep scepticism that tax increases are needed. While just under a third (32%) thought increases were necessary, 45% did not.
Only one in 10 Reform voters thought Ms Reeves needed to raise taxes, compared with 49% of voters for Sir Keir Starmer’s party.
John O’Connell, chief executive of the TaxPayers’ Alliance, said: “Taxpayers are rightly terrified about the prospect of yet more bruising tax rises. Everyone except the Chancellor and the Prime Minister can see the devastation last year’s Budget has brought upon businesses, family farms and private schools. Yet Reeves is clearly coming back for more.
“Ministers could take a weight off the public’s shoulders by simply promising an end to tax hikes.”
Ms Reeves was widely seen as preparing the ground for tax increases in her conference speech in which she warned of having to take hard decisions in the “coming months” against a backdrop of “harsh global headwinds” and “long-term damage to the economy”. It is claimed the public finances are facing a shortfall of approximately £30billion but the Labour manifesto contains a pledge not to “increase National Insurance, the basic, higher, or additional rates of Income Tax, or VAT”.
Revenue-raising options include extending the freeze in the rate at which people start paying income tax – which could result in more pensioners being taxed – and making changes to inheritance tax and capital gains tax.
Callum Price of the Institute of Economic Affairs said: “The public are right – taxes are going up, but they don’t have to. We already have a generational high tax burden and public spending is out of control.
“The Government should put spending cuts first, and resist punishing businesses and tax payers ever more, which will only keep damaging our economy and perpetuating the doom loop we are in.”
