Tax cuts are not a lurch to the right, says Clegg
Friday, 18 July 2008
Print
Email
Nick Clegg denied he was lurching to the right as he insisted his party's tax- cutting proposals were "very very different" to Conservative plans.
He said the Government should "pull in its belt" at a time of straitened economic conditions and cut the tax burden on ordinary families.
Yesterday, he accused ministers of taking "a collective duvet day", insisting they had "messed up our economy" by a decade-long experiment in "pouring money in through a funnel in No 10 Downing Street". He declared: "The era of big, wasteful, intrusive government has come to an end."
A glossy, 14-page statement of values and vision published yesterday committed the party to scrap ID cards, end the fingerprinting of schoolchildren and stop holding the DNA of people who have not been convicted of a crime.
It promised to lead international disarmament talks, expand access to education and give people help to cut their carbon emissions. Other plans include offering guaranteed care for the elderly to ensure people do not have to sell their homes to pay residential care and a guarantee that patients will have state-funded treatment in private hospitals if the NHS fails to treat them in time.
Economic proposals include ensuring the Bank of England takes account of housing costs when setting interest rates and shift the tax system to pay for income tax cuts with green charges and increases in taxes on wealth.
Mr Clegg rejected suggestions that the shift represented a move onto Conservative territory. He told the BBC: "It's impeccably liberal to say you should have a fairer tax system. We have always argued for a fairer tax system. People on low incomes still pay a much higher proportion of their income on tax than people on high incomes.
"It is that tradition we are taking forward now, setting out the direction of travel saying the tax system should be much fairer and tax cutting should come from the bottom up from people on low and middle incomes.
"That is very, very different to the traditional Conservative tax-cutting agenda, which is from the top benefiting people at the top hoping somehow it will trickle down. We have moved with the times. About 10 years ago, we were a party that rightly identified a lack of investment in public services as a major issue in British politics.
"Since then spending by the Government of our money has doubled from £300bn to £600bn today."
Mr Clegg's pledge to cut the tax burden contrasts sharply with David Cameron, who warned earlier this week that tax rises may be necessary and that the state of the economy meant no guarantees of tax cuts were possible.
In yesterday's document, which will be debated at the party's conference in September, Mr Clegg borrows the language of Barack Obama's campaign, saying: "It's no use wishing things were different. We've got to make it happen. If you join me, we can."
It dispenses with the Liberal Democrat's traditional bright yellow in favour of a muted green background and has been written to appeal to voters disenchanted with mainstream politics.
