The level of taxation upon Britain’s middle classes has become ‘grotesque’, Peter Hitchens tells Sarah Vine on a new Daily Mail podcast.
Hitchens was responding to reports that Chancellor Rachel Reeves is considering a seller’s tax on properties over £500,000, alongside inheritance tax changes that would include pensions in taxable estates.
The broadcaster said he had warned voters that Starmer’s Labour would target savers, claiming the party will come ‘after everything’.
You can listen to the latest episode of Alas Vine & Hitchens by clicking the player below or here
Hitchens acknowledged however that it is futile to blame a single party for Britain’s massive tax burden. He said that successive governments have overpromised and overspent on ‘rubbish’.
‘It’s amazing that anybody bothers saving anymore’, Hitchens told columnist Sarah Vine.
‘We were warned Labour would do this. Remember, during the last election, Sir Keir Starmer said that what he meant by ‘working people’ was those that didn’t have any savings.
‘At that point, people should have realised that they needed to move heaven and earth to not allow this government to come into office.
‘These people will come after everything. The Tories were bad, but these people are much, much worse.’
Co-host Vine agreed with Hitchens, arguing that while the tax burden was also too high under the Conservatives, Labour’s fiscal policy risks breaking the ‘backbone’ of British society.
Hitchens was responding to reports that Chancellor Rachel Reeves is considering a seller’s tax on properties over £500,000, alongside inheritance tax changes
Peter Hitchens: ‘These people will come after everything. The Tories were bad, but these people are much, much worse.’ Listen here
‘The backbone of this country is the striving middle classes’, Vine said.
‘They do the right thing, they save money, they buy a house, they make sure their front gardens are neat, and they take their bins out.
‘What Labour are doing is breaking that backbone. Once that’s gone, it will not come back.
‘A fundamental British sense of fair play is being eroded… I think if you start coming after houses and pensions, people will start asking themselves, what’s the point?
‘Why don’t I just put my hand out like everyone else and suck off the state’s teat?’
Their concerns about Labour’s tax policies come amid growing questions over the government’s financial management.
Despite record annual tax receipts, economists warn the Chancellor faces a £50 billion black hole if Rachel Reeves is to meet her fiscal rules and restore the headroom she planned.
Filling this new black hole has sparked speculation about where the exchequer could find the money ahead of the Chancellor’s Autumn statement.
‘Why can’t the government just say, we can’t spend any more money on the NHS?‘, Vine asked her co-host.
Sarah Vine: ‘Why don’t I just put my hand out like everyone else and suck off the state’s teat?’ Listen here
Despite record annual tax receipts, economists warn the Chancellor faces a £50 billion black hole if Rachel Reeves is to meet her fiscal rules
‘We can’t spend any more money on welfare. We’re going to have to reprioritise.
‘I run a budget… You cut your cloth to suit your coat.’
Hitchens traced many of the government’s current problems managing public finances back to an inability to control inflation.
The broadcaster claimed that governments have a vested interest in keeping inflation high to cheapen debt and continue their spending splurge.
He said: ‘In our system, an awful lot of people have a stake in inflation because they are heavily indebted, and inflation shrinks debt to nothing.
‘The biggest person in the country with a stake in inflation is the government.
‘They’re not as afraid of it as they ought to be, and it’s a terrific social destabiliser.
‘I believed for many years that there would never have been any Hitler, if it hadn’t been for inflation.
‘It’s terribly politically and socially dangerous, as well as economically impoverishing.’
To listen to the columnists take down of Labour’s tax plans in full, search for Alas Vine and Hitchens now, wherever you get your podcasts.