The utter loss of faith in mainstream politics is laid bare by the new British Social Attitudes survey, which shows that just 12 per cent of people in this country trust governments to put the country’s interests before their own.
“The Tories are utterly on their knees,” one influential Conservative insider tells me. But adds: “The problem is that Reform are not serious.”
One of his allies says: “We absolutely know that right now, we are not worthy of a majority in the House of Commons – but we want to be. And the self-knowledge that we are not worthy is something not shared by the other parties!”
The plan would involve a “Britannia card” which could be purchased for £250,000 by foreigners who wish to live in the UK for 10 years without having to pay tax on their global income – in effect, resurrecting the former non-dom regime – with all the proceeds going as handouts to people in full-time work on low pay.
But the party’s suggested solution is impractical for a number of reasons. It would allow multi-millionaires who have no plans to quit the UK to save big by paying a one-off £250,000 fee to shield their worldwide assets, saving them hundreds of thousands of pounds a year.
Tax expert Dan Neidle has calculated that the Exchequer would lose £34bn over five years if this policy were implemented. The Institute for Fiscal Studies is more polite, but warns it is “far from clear” that the plan would raise any money for the Treasury at all.
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This is a pattern. Reform wants to hike the threshold at which people start paying income tax to £20,000 from its current level of £12,570 – another staggeringly expensive idea, with most of the gains going to those who are already comfortably off. The party would not only remove net-zero obligations from businesses – which would arguably have some merit – but would actively prevent companies from investing in clean technology, with taxes on solar farms and a ban on battery storage.
To be fair, Reform is not alone in being economically incoherent. The Labour leadership is struggling with its own MPs to deliver on its welfare plans; the Conservatives hardly have any policies at all; and the Liberal Democrats oppose every tax rise, every spending cut and every increase in borrowing.
But for now, despite Farage’s success in the polls, there is no evidence he and his colleagues are ready to run the world’s sixth largest economy.
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