The need to find a fairer system of taxing and spending in the UK | Letters
by Letters from on (#2NRXG)
Letters from Terry Kelly, Ruth Lister, Dr David Griffith, David Beard, Peter Fieldman and Richard Cooper in response to Guardian reports and Paul Mason's article
It did not take long in the current election campaign for the Conservatives to trot out the old myth of Labour being the party of high taxation while the Tories are "tax cutters by instinct" (Tories redeploy the 'bombshell' against Labour tax plans, 4 May).
It may be true to say the Tories favour unfair cuts in direct taxation, but this certainly cannot be said of their less progressive and equitable "instinct" of increasing indirect taxation. Let's not forget it was Margaret Thatcher who raised VAT from 8% to 15% only weeks after denying there were any plans to do so during the 1979 election campaign, and it was George Osborne who raised it from 17.5% to 20% following similar denials in 2010.
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