Farage says substantial tax cut ‘not realistic’

Nigel Farage He said substantial tax cuts “are not realistic at the present time” as he pledged that Reform UK would lead to “the most pro-business” government in modern history.

Reform UK leader used a speech London Britain argued on Monday that Brexit had “ruined” Brexit by promising sweeping regulation.

He said the party would remove inheritance tax from family farms and family-run businesses and “raise the threshold at which people start paying tax”.

If elected, Reform UK would “significantly cut the benefits bill” and “reduce the size of the public sector”, Mr Farage said, adding that all disability claims would be reassessed and “dealt with on an individual basis”.

speaking in banking hall City of LondonMr Faraz said: “We want to cut taxes, of course we do, but we understand a substantial tax cut given the dire state of the debt and our finances is not realistic at the moment.

“There are some relatively modest things we will do: we will immediately remove IHT from family farms and family-run businesses, and we will raise the threshold at which people start paying tax to begin the process of getting people out of the debt trap of working 16 hours a week that too many people find themselves in.”

The Reform UK leader said: “One My own biggest disappointment is that Brexit has been ruined. The opportunity to sensibly deregulate, the opportunity to be globally competitive, has all been missed.

“And worst of all, the rules and the way regulators treat British business are worse now than at the time of the Brexit referendum vote.”

He also said: “We will become the most pro-business, pro-enterprise government this country has seen in modern times.

“We will bring people with real business expertise in their field into the government as advisers or ministers.”

Mr Faraz predicted there would be a general election in 2027 “due to the economic collapse”.

He added, “I want as many high-earning people to stay in this country and pay as much tax as they legally have to, because if the rich go away and the rich don’t pay taxes, then all the poor in society will have to pay more taxes.”

Mr Faraz said Reform UK was “not a one-man band” but had a “wide team”.

The Reform manifesto committed the party to tax cuts worth almost a third of the NHS budget, including increasing the personal allowance to £20,000, introducing a £100,000 tax-free allowance for companies and exempting some high street firms from business rates.

At the time, the Institute for Fiscal Studies said that the plans, with spending commitments of £50 billion and cuts of £150 billion, were “problematic” and cost far more than Reform claimed.

Speaking on BBC Newsnight later on Monday, the party’s policy chief Zia Yusuf refused to recommend a figure of £150 billion in spending cuts, saying only that there would be at least a £25 billion cut.

He suggested that money could be raised by cutting the amount of welfare expenditure for foreign nationals, saying: “We favor people who set their alarm clocks before they go to bed and get up early in the morning – people who work.”

He was asked to suggest British citizens who set their alarm clocks would not be affected by Reform’s spending cuts, to which he replied: “Yes, that’s a fair reflection.”

Pressed on reports that tax rises are likely to be introduced in reform-held local authorities such as Kent, he argued that councilors have “no power over the criteria” for who receives social care.

Amid scrutiny of his previous praise for former Tory Prime Minister Liz Truss’s mini-budget in 2022, Mr Youssef also defended the reform leader’s economic decisions and said he had since changed his stance.

“As a result of that he (Mr Farage) has upgraded his systems… he has seen what has happened,” he said.

,People It’s worth watching this program to see someone who is able to look at the data and upgrade their perceptions as a result, and that’s why Reform won’t make the same mistakes Liz Truss did.

Mr Youssef also distanced the party in 2021 from former Welsh Reform leader Nathan Gill, who has since been convicted of taking pro-Russian bribes.

Asked whether an existing person within the party could also do the same, he said, “No, not at all.”

“At present there is no one like that within the party,” he said.

Labor said Mr Farage’s new proposals would “take us back to austerity”.

A party spokesperson said: “We have seen from the council reform run that they are already failing to deliver the savings promised and are cutting services and raising taxes as a result.

“He himself has said that these councils are a shop window for what a reform government will do at the national level – we know this is more empty promises and no real plan.”

Conservative Shadow Chancellor Sir Mel Stride said that improving the economy could not be taken seriously “when their promises fall apart after five minutes, and they remain committed to additional welfare spending and huge expansions of the state”.

He said: “They are a one-man band and in a desperate attempt to appear financially credible they have reneged on recent commitments.

“In local government they have failed to find savings and are instead planning tax increases on hard-working families.”