Labour must also take urgent action to deal with the social emergency facing millions right here and now.
Britain remains in the grip of a cost-of-living emergency. Though it no longer dominates the headlines as it did a couple of years ago, millions of people are still being forced to make impossible choices between heating their homes and putting food on the table.
Poll after poll shows this is the single biggest issue in British politics — however much Nigel Farage tries to shift the focus by scapegoating asylum seekers, Muslims, or whoever else falls foul of the never-ending attempt to divide and rule.
Yet while so many have been pushed to the brink, the wealth of those at the very top continues to skyrocket. British billionaires’ wealth has more than doubled in recent years and is growing by £35 million every single day.
The glaring inequality that scars our society is no accident — it is the direct result of nearly fifty years of neoliberal capitalism, unleashed by Thatcher’s war on workers and wave of privatisations, that have never been properly reversed.
A Labour government should act boldly, guided by socialist principles, to tackle this head-on. Bringing energy and water back into public ownership, a mass programme of council house building and introducing rent caps are the kind of structural changes that would take life’s essentials out of the hands of the market and end the rip-off facing ordinary people.
But while we fight for such measures, Labour must also take urgent action to deal with the social emergency facing millions right here and now.
That’s why I’m calling on the Government to use the Autumn Budget to introduce a package of wealth taxes to create a Social Emergency Fund — providing immediate support for people hit by soaring food, energy, and housing costs.
Over 10,000 people have already signed my open letter calling on the Prime Minister and Chancellor to act — which I will deliver on the eve of the Budget.
This package of measures would target the very richest and could raise tens of billions every year. It includes:
- A 2% Annual Wealth Tax on assets above £10 million — raising £24 billion per year
- Equalising Capital Gains Tax with Income Tax — closing a loophole that means wages are often taxed at higher rates than income from wealth, raising £12 billion per year
- Clamping down on tax avoidance, corporate loopholes, and strengthening enforcement — generating billions more each year
Billions more could be raised with a windfall tax on the profits of the Big Four banks. Set at the same rate as the one on the super-profits of the oil and gas giants, this could bring in a further £14 billion a year. With banks making record profits from the higher interest rates that are hammering households, clawing back a share of those windfalls is only fair.
Together, these modest measures on wealth and super-profits could raise well over £50 billion per year.
That’s more than enough to deliver a Social Emergency Fund to guarantee some immediate relief to struggling households. Below are five examples of the kind of policies that the government could deliver in that:
1. Introduce Cost-of-Living Grants: These were delivered in the aftermath of the Covid crisis and as energy prices surged. Reintroducing similar grants of up to £900 for low-income households, alongside support for disabled people and pensioners, would cost around £11bn and provide a real boost to incomes this winter.
2. Scrapping the Two-Child Benefit Cap: Experts say no other measure would do more to tackle child poverty than this, lifting hundreds of thousands of children out of hardship overnight. Scrapping the cap fully would cost £2 billion this year rising to £3 billion by 2030.
3. Universal Free School Meals: In the sixth-richest country on Earth, ensuring every child has a nutritious hot meal each day should be the most basic of expectations. Universal free school meals would not only cut child hunger but also save families—already hit by soaring food prices—hundreds of pounds a year. Experts estimate the cost at around £2.5–3 billion.
4. Expand the Household Support Fund: This fund allows local authorities to provide vital, tailored grants to people in hardship — from help with energy and water bills to food, school uniforms and other essentials. But it is woefully underfunded. Tripling it to £3 billion per year, for example, would give councils resources to offer more people support during this cost-of-living crisis.
5. Re-Link Local Housing Allowance to Market Rents: This Allowance is intended to ensure people can afford to rent properties in their local area. But the freezing of the allowance, at a time of soaring rents, has left too many families with a shortfall — forcing them to cut back on other essentials just to keep a roof over their heads. Restoring the link with local market rates would cost around £2.5-3.5bn depending on the level it is set at.
The cost of these emergency measures is around £23bn – far below the amount raised by the tax rises above highlighting how the government could easily be doing much more to tackle the cost-of-living crisis.
And there’s no shortage of other policies coming from the experts — from a wider benefits uplift to calls for a protected minimum floor for Universal Credit levels as a first step towards an Essentials Guarantee.
The key point is that, just like with austerity, the decision on whether to act is a political choice.
Britain has the wealth to deal with this crisis — but it is being hoarded at the top. So we should not stand by while destitution is normalised and 7 million people in Britain are unable to afford essentials like food, energy, and toiletries.
Tackling this crisis is exactly the kind of change people wanted to see when they backed Labour at the General Election.
In recent days, Westminster has been dominated by the usual political soap opera — the kind of spectacle that puts most people off politics.
The Budget should instead be a chance to respond to the urgent realities of people’s lives and address the cost-of-living crisis by taxing those who have done so well out of our rigged economy.
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