Defiant PM rejects MPs’ calls to water down tax credit cuts
THE Prime Minister yesterday rejected calls from some Tories for tax credit cuts to be watered down.
Mr Cameron i nsisted he would hold firm, despite warnings that the policy could become politically toxic.
Critics have claimed up to 3.2 million households could lose an average of £1,350 a year from their tax credits. Letters will go out telling people how much they will ‘lose’ just before Christmas.
But Mr Cameron defended the changes, insisting the new living wage would help to ‘make work pay’.
He said he wanted to move to an economy ‘where you get paid more and where you pay less in tax’.
Several senior Tories have raised concerns about the prospect of millions of workers losing out, and fear it could harm attempts by the party to claim the mantle of the workers’ party.
Former education minister David Willetts – who was nominated for a life peerage in August – told the BBC: ‘There is a real risk that it could turn sour as some of those hardworking families that politicians love realise they are heavy losers.
‘If the goal is a genuine blue- collar conservatism, it must be a priority for the Autumn Statement and spending review to ease a policy which could otherwise do the same kind of political damage as Labour’s abolition of the 10 per cent income tax band.’
Mr Cameron told the Andrew Marr Show: ‘We are protecting the lowest-paid people with child tax credits and what goes with it, but we are moving to an economy where you get paid more and where you pay less in tax, rather than paying more in tax and getting the money back in tax credits. That is a better system.’