Stamp Duty Land Tax

Jim Dickson Excerpts

Tuesday 28th October 2025 Commons Chamber

[Jim Dickson (Dartford) (Lab)]

Like many in this House and many of my constituents in Dartford, I have had the dubious pleasure of paying stamp duty. I can testify to the fact that doing so when buying a home is not a pleasant experience. That is one small reason why I am sympathetic to the case for reform of property taxation in this country when properly thought through, as others have said. However, this proposal, from the party that brought us the former right hon. Member for South West Norfolk as Prime Minister, is simply not a serious one.

At the Conservative party conference in Manchester, the Leader of the Opposition, who previously was going to spend three years thinking through her party’s new policy platform—no doubt looking at all the alternatives and thinking through what the effects might be—produced a proposal, like a rabbit out of a hat, to abolish stamp duty on the purchase of main homes. The Institute for Fiscal Studies reckons that, if that decision were implemented after the 2029 general election, it would cost the country or the Exchequer about £11 billion a year in lost revenue. Surprisingly, or perhaps unsurprisingly given the fiscal situation left by the Conservative party last July, there is no serious proposal to replace the revenue. Instead, we have a promise that this policy would be paid for by taking the axe once more to spending on public services, with a promise of £47 billion in savings—a proposal to return this country to the austerity that was so roundly rejected by our constituents a little more than a year ago. Indeed, the £47 billion includes a saving, as others have said, of £23 billion on welfare—a figure vastly in excess of anything the previous Government even approached during their 14 years in office, and in fact welfare spending went up during that time. So to attempt to make such a saving on the timescale they are suggesting would inevitably mean a big increase in the number of families in our country living in poverty.

I take a moment to remind the House of the state of the public services and public finances at the end of the 14 years of Conservative Government—a plethora of unfunded spending commitments, and departmental spending plans that were so out of touch with reality that they left, as has been said many times, a huge black hole which this Government have had to try to fill.

Now Opposition Members are proposing to cut public services even further. This is not a serious plan to improve those public services or invest in or grow our economy. Clearly, stamp duty is a far from perfect tax and we should have a sensible debate on property tax reform, but this just isn’t it. In the short term, for instance, it would be possible to increase the number of council tax bands to capture the higher-value properties in some parts of the country and redistribute some of that income elsewhere. In the longer term, a wider reform of council tax and other property taxes could provide a fairer way of taxing property so that those with broadest shoulders bear the greatest burden. Instead, as a former adviser to the party opposite when in government, Tim Leunig, said, this would be

“a very, very big tax cut for rich people”

and would have the effect of pushing house prices further out of the reach of first-time buyers.

The motion is disappointing. It is fantasy economics from what used to be a serious political party. I hope that the House will reject its motion today.