Labour has no plans to adopt Unite's wealth tax plan, says cabinet minister
25 August 2024, 13:30 | Updated: 25 August 2024, 14:11
Labour has no plans to adopt Unite's wealth tax plan, a cabinet minister has said.
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The union wants an emergency one per cent wealth tax on the assets of the super-rich to pay for 10 per cent pay rises for public sector workers to fill out more than 100,000 NHS vacancies.
However, when speaking on LBC to Ben Kentish, Cabinet officer Pat McFadden said: "We have no plans to pursue that particular policy."
When asked when the country will expect to see a positive change under Labour, he said: "I think they've seen a positive change already. We've announced a national wealth fund.
"As I said, we've lifted the ban on onshore wind. We've said that we will settle some of these industrial disputes and get the country back to work.
"We've seen positive change already and more will come. We will make sure that we get financial stability first.
"That's got to be the foundation for everything else."
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The demand from Unite is one of several tabled to the Trades Union Congress, which meets in Brighton next month and will reveal tensions between Keir Starmer's government and parts of the union movement.
It comes as Rachel Reeves is preparing for her first budget as chancellor, on 30 October.
Labour MPs and ministers are expecting the TUC conference to represent a moment of truce between unions and Labour, boosting Starmer's general election campaign - which might begin to falter when the prime minister and Reeves re-emphasise their commitment to fiscal responsibility and stress the need for hard decisions if the economy is to improve.
Other key trade unions are getting ready to implement further changes from Labour, like getting rid of the two-child benefit cap, which Starmer has at the moment resisted, plus the reversal of the recent decision to end winter fuel payments for millions of pensioners, which has prompted backlash among Labour backbenchers.
Reeves is thought to be looking at increases in capital gains and inheritance taxes in the budget, wheres Unite's motion to the TUC conference extends further.
They say local authorities are in financial danger and that there desperately needs to be a boost to public investment which can't wait for economic growth.
