Cut taxes raise benefits

This is not the time for tax increases, which is what the Government is doing by pushing up national insurance, income tax and some rates of VAT. It is making the crisis worse. We need tax cuts. Temporary cuts in the rate of tax on energy and road fuel make sense. So too would big cuts in national insurance to help keep people in work. Some inflation is being driven by the well-off: increasing taxes on them makes sense.

Important as tax cuts are, they are not as significant as benefit increases in getting help to those who need it most. The £20-a-week cut in