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TAX NEWS: Brown blasts tax cut demands. By Dan Martin

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29th Aug 2006
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Gordon Brown has added his voice to the current Whitehall dispute over taxes by warning his Labour party colleagues to beware of calling for "unfounded tax cuts".

Adding to the growing rift between the Treasury and Number 10 over taxes, Brown's comments are being seen as a veiled attack on Blairite MP Stephen Byers who last week called for the abolition of inheritance tax as well as a response to suggestions that the Conservative party is formulating plans to cut stamp duty on share trading.

Writing in the 'Financial Times', Brown said: "No political party will be trusted if it promises stability in one breath and unfunded tax cuts in the next.

"To make unfunded promises, to play fast and loose with stability (indeed to play politics with stability) is a return to the bad old days ' something I will never do and the British people will not accept."

The Chancellor also played up his personal record on achieving tax cuts and stability.

"[Making] the right long-term choices for Britain requires us to resist easy options and at all times, budget by budget, strike the right balance between keeping tax low and meeting the needs of public investment and stability," he said.

While Brown, who was making his first public comments since the birth of his new son James, did not mention particular tax cut demands, Treasury economic secretary Ed Balls specifically referred to inheritance tax.

Speaking on BBC Radio 4's 'Today' programme, he said: "In the case of inheritance tax, we have been raising the threshold, but to pay £3 billion-plus to abolish inheritance tax - a proposal that was never supported even by Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s, and I don't think represents the broad mainstream view of Labour MPs or, in fact, MPs in the House of Commons - to go down the road of short-term sectional gestures on taxation would be exactly the wrong way to make sure we can address these long-term policy issues."

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By AnonymousUser
12th Sep 2006 09:27

Joyce & Sybil Burden
These elderly sisters have been forced to spend what may be their twilight years worrying about the consequences of IHT on the survivor. They are taking a case to the ECHR on the grounds of discrimination following the extension of the s.18 spouse exemption to civil partners. The issue seems to be whether they, as cohabitees, are in an objectively similar position to a civil partnership couple.

Each and every time that the UK is taken to the ECHR or the ECJ by an oppressed citizen, the nation bears the shame of that oppression. In the case of these sisters, their concern is that the survivor will be evicted from the home of her childhood by Brown's gang. If Brown was her landlord, he would surely face a custodial sentence for such bullying and intimidation. But he is not and it is all legalised. And he gets grace and favour accommodation.

This tax needs a full review. At the very least, there should be a holdover relief in the case of a shared home.

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By AnonymousUser
30th Aug 2006 12:49

Frauds
Perhaps if GB and his acolyte, Ms Primarolo, put half as much effort into stopping frauds such as VAT carousel or tax credits, there would be enough of our money left to enable better funding of hospitals and a tax cut.

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By User deleted
31st Aug 2006 16:49

and the Others
Not to mentioned the waste, IT failures, more monies to the EU, quangos, taxi fares, wild parties, selling our gold, PFI finance, more layers of hopeless appointments, Spin doctors etc..... the list could go on and on.

Time for GB to get a grip of all these and clean up the Labour Govt. once and for all

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By drann.sandersonssolicitor
04th Sep 2006 13:48

You do make me laugh Mr Brown
Gordon Brown makes me laugh (the alternative is depression and I am not a person prone to depression); does he honestly think that anyone believes his rubbish anymore? Granted it has taken 5 or 6 years for the old Labour tax and spend policies to come out into the open but anyone with an ounce of sense should see his pronouncements for what they are, ideological statements of the Labour old school. I can only hope that the vast majority of the population start to see this too and do the decent thing at the next election.

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By User deleted
05th Sep 2006 09:43

Small Government
All the comments posted so far seem relevant. But the main enemy surely is big - too big - government. Too much power ceded to the state.

If there were less state involvement in our affairs there would be less scope for all the ills - inefficiency, incompetence, wastage, fraud, etc - that flow from it.

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