Housing Secretary Angela Rayner has challenged Kemi Badenoch to drop a package of Conservative tax pledges which Labour calculates would cost £17 billion and mainly benefit the wealthiest households.
Labour's figure covers Conservative plans to scrap the council tax surcharge on homes worth more than £2 million, cut inheritance tax on properties worth over £1 million and remove VAT from private school fees. Labour says middle-income households would not gain a penny from the measures.
Angela Rayner: 'The same old Tories'
"Kemi Badenoch's £17 billion golden giveaway for the wealthiest shows this is just the same old Tories: they haven't changed," said Angela Rayner, the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government and Labour MP for Ashton-under-Lyne. "When it comes to tax cuts, the richest in society are always the people they think of first."
"The Tories' economic credentials have long been in tatters. They oversaw rocketing debt and interest rates, which hammered family finances," she said. "Kemi Badenoch must prove she's not making the same old Tory mistakes and scrap these reverse Robin Hood plans for the most well off."
"Andy Burnham's Labour Government is bringing back hope, providing much needed breathing space on the cost of living and putting power back into people's hands in every postcode across Britain."
Conservatives dispute the figure
The Conservatives rejected Labour's characterisation as "total nonsense". A party spokesperson said a Conservative government would cut energy bills by £200, scrap stamp duty, abolish business rates for the vast majority of high street businesses and halve employer National Insurance for workers aged 21 to 24.
The exchange sharpens the dividing line ahead of Wednesday's Budget, the first to be delivered by Chancellor John Healey since Andy Burnham became Prime Minister. Labour intends to contrast its help with the cost of living against what it calls Conservative tax cuts for those with the broadest shoulders.
