Politics | 11 July 2009

The debate over the 10p tax controversy on Tuesday was more like a requiem for the Labour party than a rebellion. MPs spoke mournfully about how — yet again — their government would hit the poorest hardest. Gordon Brown had used the 2007 Budget to trick newspapers into reporting that he had lowered the basic rate of tax — when, in fact, he had doubled the 10p starting rate, and left millions of low earners worse off. The Prime Minister had chosen deceit over principle, and Labour MPs had gathered, once more, to discuss what this said about their party.

Why, David Drew, MP for Stroud, asked, is the government causing such ‘hurt amongst core Labour supporters?’ Kate Hoey (Vauxhall) read out a letter from a constituent conveying ‘outrage towards my Labour government that such an attack should be made on low earners like me’. What, Lynne Jones (Birmingham Selly Oak) wanted to know, is so difficult about raising the thresholds and taking people out of tax altogether? Taxing the many not the few, said Frank Field (Birkenhead), ‘flies in the face of what the party is all about’.