New Wealth Taxes

Debate between Richard Burgon and Christopher Chope

Tuesday 14th June 2022 Westminster Hall

[Sir Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)]

Does the hon. Member realise that there is nothing to stop those wealth owners who support a wealth tax making voluntary contributions to the Exchequer?

[Richard Burgon]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his illustrative intervention, but I would paraphrase a former Labour Prime Minister, Clement Attlee: charity as a substitution for taxation can be a cold, heartless model. We should not be depending on the voluntary generosity of those at the very top to fund our public services. That creates a scenario that is almost servant and master—blessed is the giver and blessed is the receiver.

The UK does not have a wealth tax. Ministers have previously responded to me by saying that in practice we do, through taxes such as capital gains tax, but, while those earning wages are taxed on every penny of their income above permitted allowances, the same does not apply to the accumulation of wealth. For example, capital gains tax does not apply to all wealth but only to increases in the value of particular items of wealth. Structurally, we tax income much more rigorously than we do wealth. Of course, that favours the wealthy, as it is designed to do. I am afraid it is simply not good enough to pretend that even that system is working.

Health and Social Care Levy Bill

Debate between Richard Burgon and Christopher Chope

Committee stage & 3rd reading
Tuesday 14th September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Richard Burgon]

It is useful that Members on both sides of the Committee are coming clean with all sorts of ideas. I would assert the principle of universalism—universalism of the welfare state and universalism of the NHS.

[Sir Christopher Chope]

I thought that might be the hon. Gentleman’s response. Today we are talking about social care as well as healthcare, and the principle of universalism does not apply to social care because it is and will continue to be the subject of means-testing.

The Government talk the talk of integrating health and social care, and I had an exchange with my right hon. Friend the Minister on this subject. He justifies having a health and social care levy on the basis that they are interdependent. If they are interdependent and we are moving towards an integrated scheme, why do we not apply the same principles to both NHS healthcare and social care? We could have means-testing for healthcare, in the same way as we have for social care, or we could not have any means-testing for social care, in the same way as we do not have any means-testing for healthcare. If we are going to merge the two schemes, we need to resolve those anomalies. I am afraid that everything that has come out of this short debate shows that the Bill is a muddled fudge that perpetuates the distinction between health and social care but does not meet the challenge I put to the Minister: why not have a distinct social care levy?

Is it reasonable that we should have co-payment in the NHS? If so, it would generate an enormous amount of additional income. We essentially have co-payment on prescription charges, ophthalmology services, dentistry and, increasingly, audiology services. The idea that we should have co-payment more widely, so that people who can afford it contribute, say, half the cost of an orthopaedic operation, seems to be anathema to the Government. I do not understand why, if they want to get more money into the system.

Our system differs from most overseas systems. We are not spending more on healthcare in this country, but we are spending more on publicly funded healthcare and not enough on privately funded healthcare. I would like to see a Government strategy to encourage more investment by ordinary individuals in the healthcare system. I have a private Member’s Bill on co-payment coming up in the new year, but perhaps before that we might be able to get some movement from the Government on these principles. We have co-payment in the social care sector. If it is all right in the social care sector, why is it not all right in the healthcare sector? We are excluding hotel costs—the board and lodging costs—from the £86,000 social care threshold, but we do not charge any hotel costs to rich people who are in hospital. Why not? There does not seem to be any logic in that.

I am glad it looks like the Minister will have a long time to answer these points and the other important points raised by my hon. and right hon. Friends. If we are going to have a complete review and fundamental change of outlook on health and social care, we need to meet those challenges. What is the answer as to why we do not charge hotel costs for millionaires in hospital? That would introduce more income into the service and bring it into line with what happens with social care.

Those questions remain to be answered, but there are a whole lot more besides. I was looking at the Official Report of an exchange in the other place yesterday evening. The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, Lord Bethell, said that

“we recognise that family carers play a vital role. When we announced an additional £4.5 billion over three years for social care, it included a commitment to take steps to ensure unpaid carers have the support, advice and respite they need.”

We know that there are about 1.6 million unpaid carers, and that was leading them to believe that there was some sort of dividend around the corner for them. However, Lord Lilley picked up on that point and asked the Minister to

“confirm that…there would be only £1.5 billion a year going to social care from the large increase in national insurance”.

Obviously, that is correct. He then asked the Minister to

“confirm that nearly half of that will be absorbed by the need to pay for the extension of free social care to those with valuable homes…That means that nothing will be left to help domestic carers.”

That was a perfectly straightforward question, and as it was not answered in the other place last night, I hope that the Financial Secretary can answer it tonight. The answer that that Health Minister gave—perhaps the Treasury has a better view on this—was that

“the maths that my noble friend has done is a little bit premature.”

I did not think that maths could ever be premature. He continued:

“The White Paper will come out later this year; it will spell out the precise financial arrangements, and I am looking forward to that.” —[Official Report, House of Lords, 13 September 2021; Vol. 814, c. 1130.]

The Minister was implying that he did not really have a clue as to what was going to be in it when it came out. That is an example of the muddled thinking, the failure of the Government to answer precise questions and the very dangerous policy of raising expectations among our constituents that somehow they are all going to be able to relax and spend all their hard-earned savings and use their houses for themselves without having to contribute much towards the long-term costs of social care.

May I throw out a suggestion arising from that exchange in the other place last night? If we have 1.6 million people providing free care for their loved ones, why are we choosing to impose upon them an extra levy, an extra tax? Surely it would be reasonable—clause 4 enables this to be done by subsidiary legislation—to exclude those who are looking after their loved ones, doing the right thing and saving the state a lot of money. We could say, “In return for doing that, you will be exempt from the 1.5% levy.”