Starmer broken pledge: Labour set to oppose any immediate corporation tax
Channel: Labour Heartlands
Date: 25/02/2021

The Tories are set to increase corporation tax Labour set to oppose
Sir Keir Starmer argued that ‘now is not the time for tax rises’ as it emerged the party would resist efforts to hike corporation tax

Sir Keir Starmer said at PMQs today: “Now is not the time for tax rises for families and for businesses.”

Asked later if Starmer’s meant opposing all tax rises, even on businesses, Labour MP James Murray said: “This is not the time to do tax rises, in the middle of an economic crisis.”

Asked if he would not support “any tax rises at all” in the Budget next week, the Shadow Financial Secretary to the Treasury told the BBC’s Politics Live: “In the Budget next week we don’t want to see tax rises, this is not the time to do that.”

Labour is set to oppose any immediate corporation tax rise in next week’s Budget in a major shift since Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership.

Before Covid struck, Labour under Jeremy Corbyn pledged in 2019 to reverse the bulk of Tory corporation tax cuts for large firms to fund the party’s radical agenda.

This gives us a sharp reminder of the Labour Party before Jeremy Corbyn and the fiasco in allowing the Welfare bill to be voted through when Harriet Harman, the interim leader, had urged Labour MPs to send a message to the electorate that they were listening to concerns over welfare payments by abstaining on the welfare bill after voting for an amendment that set out the party’s objections to the bill.

This set the course for the further impoverishment of millions of people over the last ten years 184 Labour MPs who didn’t vote against the Tories’ cuts allowed reducing the household welfare cap from £26,000 to £23,000, abolishing legally binding child poverty targets, cuts to child tax credits, cuts to Employment and Support Allowance, and cuts to housing benefit for young people. Sir Keir Starmer and the majority of his front bench where part of that 184 members to allow the welfare bill to go through while 48 Labour MPs vote against including Jeremy Corbyn.

Sir Keir Starmer as no compunction on backtracking on his word or pledges made to the membership that got him elected.

1. Economic justice
Increase income tax for the top 5% of earners, reverse the Tories’ cuts in corporation tax and clamp down on tax avoidance, particularly of large corporations. No stepping back from our core principles.