Tory voter in TV rage over cuts to tax credits says: I’ll back Corbyn
A TORY voter who berated a Cabinet minister on TV over tax credit cuts said yesterday she had abandoned the Conservatives and was backing Jeremy Corbyn.
Michelle Dorrell, who fought back tears as she confronted Energy Secretary Amber Rudd, is a single mother-offour who receives handouts of about £400 a week.
The 35-year- old angrily told Miss Rudd on BBC1’s Question Time on Thursday night that she had voted Conservative in May but felt betrayed by the decision to slash tax credits – payments to support those with young children and workers on low incomes.
Footage of her outburst revived the debate about Chancellor George Osborne’s plan to cut £4.5billion from Britain’s £30billion tax credit bill.
She told Miss Rudd: ‘I voted f or Conservatives originally because I thought you were going to be the better chance for me and my children.
‘You’re about to cut tax credits after promising you wouldn’t.
‘I work bloody hard for my money to provide for my children, to give them everything they’ve got, and you’re going to take it away from me and them.
‘I can hardly afford the rent I have to pay, I can hardly afford the bills I’ve got, and you’re going to take more from me. Shame on you.’
Miss Dorrell, whose children are aged five to 15, runs a nail salon from her home in Folkestone, Kent, but relies on the welfare system to get by. She said that after losing her job in a call centre, she went back to college to get the skills she needed to start her business and get off full-time benefits.
But she struggles to turn a profit, and warned that many of her clients were likely to be hit by the welfare reforms, which would affect her business.
She added: ‘If these people are affected by the cuts too and end up having to cut their food bill
‘Shame on you’
they’re not going to come here and get their nails done – it has a knock-on effect for everyone.’
Yesterday, she said she was considering backing Labour, adding: ‘ Corbyn i s shaking things up and allowing our voice to be heard a lot more.’
Mr Corbyn said her case was ‘gut-wrenching’. But it emerged last night that Miss Dorrell may not lose a penny in the reforms.
She gets less than £400 a week, comprising £240 in tax credits, £61.80 in child benefit, and an unspecified sum in child maintenance from her ex-partner. She also receives taxpayer help with housing and council tax.
The main t ax credit cut involves reducing the income level at which payments start to be withdrawn from £6,420 to £3,850.
But Miss Dorrell told the Mail that her business makes no profit, suggesting she may have no declarable income and therefore will not be affected.
Although she has four children, she is also unaffected by the decision to cap child tax credit payments to the first two children as this will only apply to new claimants.
Child benefit payments, which she also receives, are not being cut. Government letters outlining the impact of the changes are not due to be sent out until at least December.
No 10 said the plans should be taken together with the introduction of the national living wage, the rise in the threshold for the basic tax rate and the increase in free child care.