Raising tax to fund NHS is right thing to do – PM
BORIS Johnson said he has “absolutely no problem” with increasing national insurance for millions of workers in order to fund the NHS and social care.
The 1.25% rise in National Insurance contributions, which came into effect yesterday and was first announced by the Prime Minister last September, will apply to people in Wales and across all parts of the UK. The 1.25% rise will also apply to the contributions made by employers.
Wales will get a population-based share of the funds raised. In England, Mr Johnson is using the money to address what commentators have called the “social care crisis” as well as to pump more funds into the struggling NHS. The UK Government has promised to invest £39bn in health and social care in England over the next three years as a result of the tax increase.
Yesterday the Prime Minister said the 1.25 percentage point rise is “unquestionably the right thing” and shows the UK Government is prepared to take the “big decisions” for the country.
He acknowledged that households are facing tough times as a result of rising inflation and soaring energy bills but insisted the extra funding is needed for the NHS.
But, in a sign of concerns about the effect on household finances, Chancellor Rishi Sunak has raised the threshold at which people start paying national insurance from July, which will limit the impact of the new levy.
At the New Queen Elizabeth II Hospital in Welwyn Garden City, Hertfordshire, Mr Johnson said: “What we are doing today is unquestionably the right thing for our country, it’s the right thing for the NHS.
“Because we’ve got, here in the UK, we’ve now got backlogs, waiting lists of six million people.
“Everybody across the country knows somebody who is waiting for cancer treatment or some sort of procedure that’s crucial for their health.
“We’ve got to give our doctors and our nurses the wherewithal, the funding, to deal with that.”
He added: “I’ve got absolutely no problem with it. We’ve got to do the difficult things.
“We’ve got to take the big decisions, the right decisions for this country.”
Funding the NHS is “the biggest priority for the country”, he said.
With rising energy bills one of the biggest contributors to the squeeze on household finances, Mr Johnson said there was a “limit to the amount of taxpayers’ money” that could be used to address a global problem.
Asked whether families should eat cheaper food, not replace clothes, turn down the thermostat or turn heating off entirely, the Prime Minister said: “People obviously are going to face choices that they are going to have to make.
“We in the government will do everything that we can to help.”
The “most important thing” that could be done was to have a “strong, robust economy in which you have a high level of security in your employment”.
The health and social care levy will be used to reduce waiting times and deliver millions more scans, tests and operations.
But Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer told ITV: “The sad reality is that a lot of the money that is gathered through this tax increase today in the end is going to be filling a black hole left by the incompetence of the government on finance.”
Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed
Davey said the rise in national insurance “puts all the burden on working people”.
He told the BBC: “It doesn’t tax the unearned income of very wealthy people. It doesn’t tax the income of landlords. It puts all the burden on working people – that is wrong.
“Yes, we need more money for the NHS and social care. The Conservatives starved it of money and one reason why the pandemic was so difficult was that the Tories had underfunded the NHS.
“The problem we have at the moment is that the Conservatives are not only taking an unfair approach to funding the NHS, but they are putting this tax rise up just at the wrong moment.”