{"id":6427,"date":"2015-10-23T12:03:51","date_gmt":"2015-10-23T11:03:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/unitelive.org\/?p=6427"},"modified":"2015-10-23T12:42:37","modified_gmt":"2015-10-23T11:42:37","slug":"tax-credit-cuts-lords-battle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/?p=6427","title":{"rendered":"Tax credit cuts: Lords\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 battle"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>\n

Former chancellor Nigel Lawson is the latest among a growing group<\/a> of senior Tory statesmen who have come out against the government\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s plans to slash tax credits next April, which would decimate incomes for those in low-paid work.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Speaking yesterday (October 22) on BBC\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Radio 4 Today <\/em>programme, Lawson countered the government\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s official line that low-income earners would not lose out from the tax credit measures.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bYou cannot remove these tax credits without people being worse off,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 he said. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bThe question is who is going to be worse off. People are going to get better off as the economy grows, and it is growing and we want a successful economic policy to ensure it continues to.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bBut there is a problem,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 Lawson went on to say. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bTax credits go a long way up the scale. It goes up to half the families in the land.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The former chancellor joins prominent Conservatives including London mayor Boris Johnson, cabinet minister Andrew Mitchell, and MPs Zac Goldsmith, Heidi Allen and David Davis in publically opposing the tax credit cuts as they stand now.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Still, on Tuesday (October 20), Labour\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s motion in the House of Commons to rethink the government\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s plans \u00e2\u20ac\u201c which would cut tax credits by more than \u00c2\u01414bn and would leave 3.3m low-income earners more than \u00c2\u01411,000 worse off each year \u00e2\u20ac\u201c was defeated by a majority of 22.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

But even as tax credit cuts are moving along through Parliament, opposition continues to mount and reached a dramatic turning point when peers in the upper chamber threatened to take almost unheard of action against the cuts.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u0098Unacceptable\u00e2\u20ac\u2122<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The Liberal-Democrats in the House of Lords plan to table a \u00e2\u20ac\u015bfatal motion\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/a> on Monday (October 26), which would decline to approve the government\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s regulations on tax credits. If the motion is carried, the government will be forced to put forward alternative proposals.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Lib-Dem leader Tim Farron called the government\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s tax credit cuts \u00e2\u20ac\u015bunacceptable\u00e2\u20ac\u0165.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bDavid Cameron explicitly ruled them out during the General Election,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 he said. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bYet now he is dead set on cutting support for people who are doing the right thing and going out to work for provide for their families.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThese changes have all the hallmarks of a Poll Tax of the 21st Century,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 Farron added. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bDavid Cameron and George Osborne need to listen to those, including their own backbenchers, telling them to think again.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Another possibility on Monday is a motion tabled by a crossbench peer Lady Meacher that would force the government to delay cuts to the tax credits until it has answered for the impact analysis by the Institute of Fiscal Studies, which shows just how hard low-income households will be hit by the changes.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Finally, the Labour peer Lady Hollis plans to also table a motion on Monday that would delay the cuts until transitional measures are put into place that protect tax credit claimants who will be affected.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The government has said that any motion by the House of Lords to stop or delay the cuts would trigger a constitutional crisis and would entail overstepping their powers, arguing that peers should not meddle in financial matters introduced in the Commons.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

But the Labour party contests this, pointing to the fact that cuts to tax credits are not being introduced through the traditional route as part of a Finance Bill but are rather being pushed through in what\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s known as secondary or subordinate legislation.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The party points to a resolution peers supported in 1994 which gives the House of Lords \u00e2\u20ac\u015bunfettered freedom\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 to vote on any subordinate legislation. The Salisbury-Addison convention, which restricts peers from voting against legislation that is explicitly outlined in the ruling party\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s manifesto, also does not come into play.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

In this case, tax credit cuts were completely absent from the Tory manifesto. And as early as April, a week before the general election, prime minister David Cameron pledged not to cut tax credits<\/a>, calling child tax credits \u00e2\u20ac\u015bone of the most important benefits there is\u00e2\u20ac\u0165.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Swingeing cuts <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Unite political director Jennie Formby condemned the government for attacking working people and reversing pledges it made prior to the election.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bSwingeing cuts to tax credits will mean that the millions of families who are teetering on the edge of poverty will be plunged deep into despair \u00e2\u20ac\u201c and it is children who will be most severely hit,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 she said. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bUnions know it, independent think tanks have proven it, and even senior Tory ministers are coming out to say to Cameron and Osborne that these cuts are unacceptable.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bWhile the upper chamber rarely intervenes in such legislation, I can understand why so many in the Lords feel they have been forced into a position where they have no alternative,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 Formby went on to say.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThe Tories pledged that they would not cut tax credits before the election, but just months later they made a sharp U-turn. The government is clearly going against the will of the people \u00e2\u20ac\u201c and even against the voters who put them into power in the first place. This undemocratic abuse of power must be stopped \u00e2\u20ac\u201c and at this point, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s up to the House of Lords to stand on principle and do it.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Formby questioned the government\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s motives for slashing tax credits.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bCuts to tax credits are absolutely not a necessity, even if you accept the government\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s obsession with achieving a budget surplus,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 she explained. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bThe same savings can be made if they stop lathering the wealthiest 1 per cent with handouts that they neither need nor deserve, or by making hugely profitable transnational companies pay their taxes that many so successfully avoid.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Indeed, a recent analysis<\/a> shows that government measures that mainly benefit the rich, such as cuts to inheritance tax and an increase in the personal allowance, would free up the same amount of money the government hopes to save from tax credit cuts.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

What\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s more, the latest figures<\/a> show that last year\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s \u00e2\u20ac\u0098tax gap\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 \u00e2\u20ac\u201c the difference between the amount of tax collected and the amount the HMRC believes should have been collected stands at a staggering \u00c2\u014134bn \u00e2\u20ac\u201c more than \u00c2\u01417bn of which is attributed to direct tax evasion or avoidance.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u015bIn this light, cuts to tax credits can only be seen as a choice based on their sinister ideology that working people on low-incomes don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t deserve more than the hand that they are dealt, no matter how hard they work,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 Formby noted. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bThe Tories\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 attempt to pass themselves as the party of working people while pushing millions more into poverty will fool no-one.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Former chancellor Nigel Lawson is the latest among a growing group of senior Tory statesmen who have come out against the government\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s plans to slash tax credits next April, which would decimate incomes for those in low-paid work.   Speaking yesterday (October 22) on BBC\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Radio 4 Today programme, Lawson countered the government\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s official line […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3539,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[17],"tags":[409,44],"wps_subtitle":"Fight on for Lords to force changes ","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6427"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6427"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6427\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6429,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6427\/revisions\/6429"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3539"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6427"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6427"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6427"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}