Last week, our Labour government proposed one of the more significant budgets in post-war British history. It is a budget that decisively changes course and invests desperately needed money into our public services.
It turns the page on 14 years of Tory austerity – and the associated death-spiral of public service cuts, rising inequality and increasingly fractured communities. It offers some hope: a belief in people and society and a chance for a fairer country.
It does so by acknowledging a core fact – that to build a fair society, you need strong and accessible public services, which in turn need to be funded properly.
This budget is notable because of the scale of the revenues being raised for public services – the largest increase in a single budget since 1970 in real terms.
But its historic significance comes in the way those revenues have been raised. The Labour Party stood on a promise not to raise income tax, employee national insurance contributions and VAT – in other words, the taxes that most working people pay.
The party has kept that promise and instead proposed tax rises on those with the broadest shoulders – asset owners and businesses – making it the most progressive budget in 55 years.
It is a budget with Labour values at its core – and establishes a dramatic dividing line with the Conservative Party.
Indeed, their new leader, Kemi Badenoch, committed on her first day in post to reversing these revenue-raising measures and inflicting further devastating cuts to public services.
This budget could hardly be more consequential for Brighton and Hove. It begins the process of properly funding the public services that are most needed in our city.
It brings £22 billion for the NHS – nowhere more significant than in a city with a struggling NHS trust, high waiting lists and an A&E department that often seems in crisis.
There is a 19 per cent real-terms increase in funding for education and school buildings – so vital for Brighton and Hove given the pressures on local school budgets and the higher-than-average costs our schools face.
There is also £1 billion extra funding for special educational needs which will be welcomed by so many families locally.
The national living wage will increase by 6.7 per cent to £12.21 – about £1,400 a year for a full-time worker – a lifeline for many in a city with deep inequality and high numbers of retail and hospitality workers.
There is an increase of £1.3 billion in funding for local government – which will help protect vital local services. And significantly £5 billion of capital investment in housing, with a focus on affordable and social homes – a promising start in tackling our chronic housing crisis.
A £500 million increase in the budget for road resurfacing and pothole repairs is also something to be welcomed in every ward from Portslade to Saltdean.
This budget is a gentle reminder to our friends in the Green Party, who often try to strike a more progressive pose than the Labour Party.
Their election manifesto aspired to raise “£50 billion per year by 2030” for public services. This Labour government has raised almost that amount in our very first budget.
Winning four seats out of 650 and promising the moon on a stick is a somewhat different prospect to winning a national majority government and then delivering an historic budget for working people. That is what genuinely progressive politics looks like.
Both the Labour government and your local Labour council know full well that 14 years of destruction cannot be repaired overnight.
But this budget is a bold and compassionate move in the right direction and will begin the process of renewing our city and rebuilding the country.
Jacob Taylor is a Labour councillor and the deputy leader of Brighton and Hove City Council.
Glad to see this item is designated ‘opinion’ rather than news. Perhaps ‘Party political broadcast’ would be more appropriate.
This is the same councillor who put out a statement this week about the council’s budget on BHCC twitter feed only for them to be forced to edit it after it was pointed out to officers that he said something in the clip which wasn’t true and came across as political spin (which isn’t really allowed on council comms).
The council has now edited the clip and reposted it on Twitter after cutting the councillor’s spin out of his message. Not OK though for councillors to be saying incorrect things which look like politically motivated comments to imply the administration are going over and above what others have done before in relation to local budget consultation (when they are not). What a waste of officer time to have to check, verify, edit and repost stuff because councillors can’t be relied upon to not weave incorrect and misleading comments into the council’s social media.
This is just propaganda and spin.
Councillor Jacob Taylor is simply ignoring the post budget concerns being raised by GPs, small businesses and live music venues about the concerns many of them have about their businesses being decimated and left worse off.
He also seems oblivious to the fact that the SEND shortfall nationally is estimated at £4bn and expected to rise to £5.9bn by next year, so the Govt are far from doing anywhere near enough to stop failing vulnerable children who need this support. They have legal duties to support children struggling to access education, yet the money coming form the Govt will hardly touch the sides. What a load of waffle.
Haha more nonsense from this “progressive” long serving Bank of America employee and councillor.
I can’t actually remember Greens promising the “moon on a stick”, but weirdly can remember Labour promising nationally that they wouldn’t raise taxes (they have), and remember them forgetting to mention anything about scrapping winter fuel allowance, and locally saying they wouldn’t close schools (they did).
We’ve got a council who can’t answer phones because they don’t have enough staff to deal with basic functions, so until the council can do the basics, Councillor Taylor is the one on another planet.
Some would argue that suggests you simply have a short memory, Trevor?
On the day he took office, the Prime Minister said he wanted to restore trust to British politics “with actions, not words”. Well his actions speak for themselves.
With a Budget that contains broken promise after broken promise.
And reveals the simple truth that the Prime Minister and Chancellor have not been straight with the British people.
During the election, time and again, we Conservatives warned that Labour would tax, borrow and spend far beyond what they were telling the country.
And time and again, they denied they had any such plans.
But the truth has come out.
Proof that they planned to do this all along.
Because the Budget sees the fiscal rules fiddled.
Borrowing increased by billions of pounds.
Inflation busting handouts for the trade unions.
Britain’s poorest pensioners squeezed.
Welfare spending out of control.
And a spree of tax rises they promised the working people of this country they would not do.
National Insurance. Up.
Capital gains tax. Up.
Inheritance tax. Up.
Energy taxes. Up.
Businesses rates. Up.
First time buyer stamp duty. Up.
Pensions tax. Up.
They have fiddled the figures. They have raised tax to record levels.
They have broken their promises.
And it is the working people of this country who will pay the price.
Now the Chancellor and Prime Minister have tried to say and tell you that they had no choice.
But be in no doubt: their misleading claims about the state of the economy are nothing but a cynical political device.
Now I know Cllr Taylor doesn’t like to see residents on his own – so I put my hand out, that I will accompany him in his Moulescome & Bevendean Ward to see residents & explain why residents will have less money in their pockets.
Excellent reply. Thank you for your support Cllr. Lyons.
Cllr Lyons, while it’s easy to criticise Labour’s fiscal decisions from an opposition standpoint, the reality is that the economy Labour inherited is one of unprecedented challenges, one that the Conservatives created after 14 years fraught with scandal after scandal, wasted tax payer’s money, and a revolving door of Prime Ministers. Let me give you data from publically available numbers:
https://www.bestforbritain.org/scandalous_spending_tracker
In the last two months of their mismanagement alone, the Conservative party spent more than £6 billion to their total wasted, reaching £131,209,116,062 before Parliament was formally dissolved. Imagine what we could have done with even a portion of that money, Councillor? I’d personally be upset with my party if I were in your shoes.
“Outrageously, Conservatives forked out £32,000 of taxpayer cash to pay the legal costs of online libel by the Science and Innovation Secretary, spent £15,000 on food and booze during a single flight for Liz Truss, and blew an additional £33 million by delaying the General Election by two months. The biggest new entry was a whopping £4.7 billion to pay for Brexit checks which were introduced at the end of April.” – What an embarrassment, Cllr Lyons.
The global energy crisis, inflationary pressures, and the lasting effects of the pandemic have left both the government and local authorities with difficult choices. Raising taxes in certain areas is a necessary step to ensure that public services and welfare systems can continue to support the most vulnerable in society. A necessarily carefully crafted by Conservative evidenced disdain for the public.
Rather than focusing on petty political point-scoring, something I seem to frequently point out to you, and one that never works in your favour, mainly because of the hypocritical position you generally try it from, and one that I call you out for.
You’ve demonstrated to me that you don’t respect other people’s opinions unless they align with your own. Again, I am reminding you that it is important to engage in constructive discussions on how to navigate these tough times and ensure our communities are supported.
It’s easy to attack from the sidelines, and honestly, I’ve got 14 years of content to draw from, but, it doesn’t help anyone. Once again, I hope you do better Cllr. Lyons. Again, you are at your best when you’re serving your ward; there is a very good showing of people’s gratitude when you’re doing this. Unfortunately, provocative comments like this are an example of your worst.
Quote from Cllr Taylor about the Labour national budget: “It does so by acknowledging a core fact – that to build a fair society, you need strong and accessible public services, which in turn need to be funded properly”
Yes, more money is to be raised and spent from the budget. £40bn – which is the most raised in any UK budget ever. And at a time when we are already paying the highest percentage of GDP in tax ever. The key problem is that Labour didn’t say this before the election. They were not honest. They did not say more money needed to spent – even though it was obvious to all. Their promised tax raises were 2-3bn a year. Even with the claimed “black hole” of £22bn (Labour) actually 9.5bn (OBR) that leaves tens of billions in extra tax to be taken that was not in the manifesto.
The key problem is that the tax increase was not honest. If Labour had been, they would still have won, although perhaps with a few less seats. But we could have sensible tax rises, ones which target the most wealthy as Labour state is their aim. But by limiting what taxes could be increased, we haven’t had a proper debate on who is to be taxed more and so the poorest will suffer most. Pensioners on 12k will lose the winter fuel allowance. Cruel. What is Labour locally going to do about that? Other councils are putting money aside for those “rich” pensioners who cannot claim pension credit
We’ve seen national insurance rise (but on employers rather than employees which is Labour’s dubious small-print get out). The problem is that this taxes jobs and employers will pass on. Supermarkets have already said they will do this – so food prices will rise driving up inflation again, more cost of living problems. Certainly not helping the poorest as they have the highest spending on food as a percentage of their income. Those with mortgages will have interest rates at a higher level for longer and all of us suffer inflation for longer (all OBR conclusions from the budget). Worst still the “number 1 priority” for Labour, growth, will be reduced as businesses are taxed so don’t invest or grow (again OBR forecasts). It is economically illiterate. All stemming from the way Labour were not honest that large tax rises would be needed.
We do need more public spending to fix some areas. But also some cost-cutting and more efficiency. But why not be honest Labour? This will be remembered and, if the budget doesn’t fix the NHS, housing etc (which looks unlikely) not forgiven. And then Labour will be hated as much, or more, than the Tories.
Labour is also likely to face protests from farmers and family business owners who have worked for decades to pass on a legacy but stand to lose this to HMRC. This will reduce their work (so removing growth) and destroy lives and neighbourhoods. Farmers will fight back – and could strike leading to food chaos. Unions too likely to cause chaos in a couple of years when the budget stops providing increases. This, alongside freezing pensioners and continuing inflation will destroy Labour. Factions likely to open up within the party as differences on how to fix – ones which will make the Tories look united!
Labour had such promise. Their words were great. In power their levels of chaos have made the Tories look professional. Not to mention freebees!
We deserve better as a country. Local councillors deserve better as they will lose as the Labour brand is destroyed.
A dreadful budget, damaging to families, the British food industry, pensioners and so on. How dare this man say it helps Councils. They lied about tax increases, and now stabbing students in the back.
The state wants all your money, be you rich, poor or a business. Classic Marxism. The best way for a state to control a population is to make it utterly dependent on the state for everything.
Let’s pray they don’t give themselves a pay rise out of a council tax rise,how come the people’s party always end up fleecing the working people .
What a difference a couple of weeks makes. Absolute shambles. The lack of skills in our current government are really starting to show. Growth stagnating, farmers demonstrating, inflation tipped to go back up due to employers NI hikes, tax take down, no more cuts in interest rates. I wait to hear of the first pensioners to freeze to death over the next few days during our cold snap. Train drivers are ok tho.
Sorry I missed out job losses and the potential destruction of the hospitality sector.
Good news for France who are advertising in the press for the benefits of moving businesses to France.
Yep – it felt quite clear a few weeks ago that Cllr Taylor’s column was pre-local budget spin so that the Labour administration at the council can try and direct the comms that happens when the inevitable “tough decisions” have to be made locally by them when they oversee the council’s budget.
The thing is though, the decisions and cuts (or “savings” as councillors prefer to call them), aren’t inevitable, they are political choices and if their Labour government fail to give local councils the money they need to be able to function properly, then it is a choice they are making.
You also left out the Winter Fuel Payment scandal Chris. It was revealed yesterday that Minister DID know that pensioners would be pushed into poverty before they made the decision to scrap it, they did have the data and analysis but chose to do it anyway.
It’s looking more and more like this Labour lot are just a bunch of wannabe Tories in disguise as it does not seem they are doing much to end austerity in reality.