Brown and Cameron clash over tax

Gordon Brown and David Cameron have clashed over income tax and who would do the most to help low and middle income families.

 

On the eve of the Crewe and Nantwich by-election, the Conservative leader used prime minister's questions to again attack Brown over the 10p tax band abolition and the compensation for those worse affected. 

 

Cameron asked the prime minister whether the £2.7bn financial package would be continued into the next financial year.

 

"Shouldn't everyone conclude that this is a one-year-only change? The government giving some people some money this September and taking it all back again in April? It is one tax con followed by another," the Tory leader said.

 

Brown retorted by asking why the Tories would not say whether they supported the government's compensation and suggested that they were only interested in helping the better off.

 

"The reason why they cannot tell us whether they support it is that their priorities for tax cuts are not our priorities, their priorities are inheritance tax, stamp duty on shares, corporation tax.

 

"Let us give the tax cut to those who need it that is lower and middle income families in this country," Brown said.

 

Cameron continued by claiming that the Institute for Fiscal Studies had said that even after the changes, almost a million families will still be worse off.

 

He said: "They are amongst the poorest, and a total of 18 million people will be hit when the changes are reversed next year."

 

The prime minister retorted that the Institute had said that the "group that had benefited most from a Labour government are the lowest income groups in the country who are more than 10 per cent better off."