Conservative's election tax pledge would mostly benefit the well off

Read our analysis of the full Conservative Party manifesto here.

Tax took centre stage this week as Boris Johnson confirmed his well trailed plan to raise the National Insurance threshold.

In an unguarded moment Mr Johnson let slip the Conservative manifesto will include a promise to raise the National Insurance tax free allowance from £8,600 to £12,500.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies estimate that such a change would cost £11bn a year and would largely benefit higher earning households. 
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Depending on how the policy is implemented, the poorest workers could see up to 63% of the tax cut clawed back through a reduction in their Universal Credit payments.

Increasing the National Insurance threshold is a badly designed way to help those on the lowest incomes. It would be much better to reverse some of the £12bn in benefit cuts announced in 2015. 

Elsewhere there was a mixed bag of tax promises from the Greens and Liberal Democrats when their election manifestos launched.

We were pleased to see many ideas from our manifesto for tax equality picked up by the two parties. 

The Green Party promised to tax income from wealth the same as income from work, raise corporation tax to 24% and replace the increasingly unfair council tax with a land value tax, measures that reflect our priorities.

However, Tax Justice UK advisor, Richard Murphy, cautioned that the Greens’ plan for a £76 billion carbon tax would need to avoid hitting the poor hardest. 
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The Liberal Democrats pledged to end the tax free allowance on capital gains and to raise corporation tax to 20%. Their manifesto included an oft-repeated promise to put a penny on income tax and ‘increase’ the digital services tax. It includes welcome measures to crack down to tax avoidance.

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