Balls commits Labour to raising top rate of tax back to 50p

Speaking at Fabian Conference in Central London today, Ed Balls committed the Labour Party to reintroducing the 50p top rate of income tax as a priority for the next Labour government.

Balls told the conference:

“We will make changes to create a fairer tax system. So we will crack down on tax avoidance, scrap the shares for rights scheme and reverse the tax cut for hedge funds. 

“We want a lower 10p starting rate of tax, which would help make work pay and cut taxes for 24 million people on middle and lower incomes.

“And today I want to go further, to ensure that those with the broadest shoulders bear a fairer share of the burden.

“The latest figures show that those earning over £150,000 paid almost £10 billion more in tax in the three years when the 50p top rate of tax was in place than when the government conducted its assessment of the tax back in 2012.

“And when the deficit is still high, when tough times are now set to last well into the next parliament, when for ordinary families their real incomes are falling and taxes have risen, it cannot be right for David Cameron and George Osborne to have chosen to give the richest people in the country a huge tax cut.

“That’s why for the next parliament the next Labour government will reverse this government’s top rate tax cut, so we can finish the job of getting the deficit down and do it fairly.

“For the next Parliament, we will restore the 50p top rate of tax for those earning over £150,000. Reversing this unfair tax cut for the richest one per cent of people in the country. And cutting the deficit in a fairer way.”