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Budget will deliver “urgent relief” for millions of families and help rebuild public services
- Low and middle income households to benefit most according to Treasury analysis
Commenting on the Budget, TUC General Secretary Paul Nowak yesterday said:
“The Chancellor has delivered urgent relief to millions of hard-pressed households up and down the country and helped to rebuild our public services.
“Bringing down energy bills and taking action to make work pay will make a real difference to people struggling to get by. Scrapping the two-child benefit cap will lift hundreds of thousands of kids out of poverty. And new investment in young people, our public services and infrastructure is much needed.
“The policy decisions announced today will disproportionately benefit those low and middle income households at the sharp end – and tax increases will fall on the wealthiest.
“Fourteen years of Conservative government took a wrecking ball to living standards – with pay packets squeezed, child poverty at crisis levels and vital public services left on their knees after years of cuts.
“This government is starting to turn the page on that failed Tory era.
“But fixing the mess that the Tories left will take time. We now need to see a relentless focus on affordability and making work pay beyond this Budget.
“That’s how you rebuild the country and show you’re on the side of working people.”
On fair taxes to fund public services in the long-term, Paul added:
“The task of repairing Britain will need years of sustained investment.
“To deliver the vital funds needed to rebuild our country, we need a fair tax system where those with the broadest shoulders pay their fair share.
“With a tax on online gambling companies, a mansion tax and increased taxes on dividends and investments, the chancellor has built on the measures she announced last year to make our tax system fairer. But we need to go further in years ahead by continuing to reform and simplify our tax system and ensure that windfall profits are taxed fairly.”
On the need for a review of the OBR, Paul said:
“The TUC has consistently called for a root and branch review into the OBR.
“After months of destabilising speculation and the bemusing timing of the productivity assessment, the OBR published the Budget forecast prematurely.
“We cannot continue with the rollercoaster of speculation which surrounds fiscal events – and we cannot afford an unaccountable OBR which holds back growth through its conservative assumptions.”
Editors note’s
The Treasury’s own analysis shows:
- On average, households in the lowest income deciles in 2028-29 will benefit the most from policy decisions as a percentage of net income and increases in tax will be concentrated on the highest income households.
- On average, all but the richest 10% of households will benefit as a percentage of income from policy decisions in 2028-29.
- On average, the bottom and middle of the income distribution – 60% of all households – will receive more in public spending than they contribute in tax.
- On average, households in the lowest income decile will receive over four times as much in public spending than they pay in tax
- On the TUC’s call for a review of the OBR: https://www.tuc.org.uk/news/unaccountable-obr-risks-being-strait-jacket-growth-warns-tuc-it-calls-modernisation-body
About the TUC: The Trades Union Congress (TUC) exists to make the working world a better place for everyone. We bring together the 5.3 million working people who make up our 47 member unions. We support unions to grow and thrive, and we stand up for everyone who works for a living.
