Oral Answers to Questions

Rachel Reeves Excerpts

Tuesday 7th May 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Chancellor.

[Rachel Reeves (Leeds West) (Lab)]

At the Budget, the Chancellor set out his intention to abolish national insurance—a £46 billion annual commitment with no clear plan as to how it would be paid for. One way to do it would be to merge income tax and national insurance. Does the Chancellor agree with analysis from the House of Commons Library that shows that merging those two would increase income tax by 8p in the pound?

[Jeremy Hunt]

Which is why it is not our policy.

[Rachel Reeves]

That is strange, because the day after the Budget, the Chancellor told Sky News that

“you can end that unfairness of taxing work: you can merge income tax and national insurance.”

The late Chancellor, Nigel Lawson—the Prime Minister’s hero—warned that merging them would

“destroy the contributory principle and create many losers, especially among the elderly.”

In fact, a retired pensioner with an average occupational pension income of £198 a week would pay an additional £738 a year in tax. Is the reason that the Conservatives will not come clean not that they are planning to pick pensioners’ pockets to fund the abolition of national insurance?

[Jeremy Hunt]

If the right hon. Lady listened to my comments carefully, and I do not always give her credit for that, she would know that our policy is to abolish employees’ national insurance, and that means we want to bring it down to zero. If Labour’s strategy is to win the election by frightening pensioners with fake news stories, I would just say that Britain deserves better.