New poll suggests Britain is ready to vote for tax relief

New evidence for the potency of tax and crime as political issues comes from a major new ICM poll for The Taxpayers' Alliance.  Conservative Home is publishing it now to coincide with the first editions of The Sunday Times hitting London's streets (in which the poll findings are due to appear).

The poll finds strong public support for lower taxation and the poll's main findings are summarised on the right >>>

The poll represents a challenge to the current Tory leadership's belief that Britain's voters won't 'buy' tax cuts.  That may have been true in 1997 and 2001 when voters were hungry for investment in public services but it is probably no longer true.  Voters have seen their taxes rise but have seen little improvement in their public services.  They may be ready to support a party that offers a serious package of tax relief and public service reform.  It is vital that the Conservative leadership doesn't just look backwards but anticipates the issues likely to matter at the next General Election.  These issues may include a taxpayers' revolt as well as a demand for seismic action on crime and protection from terrorism.

Just before the last election opinion research by ICM for the Reform think tank pointed to public disappointment at public spending. 85% of voters told ICM that “taxes have gone up but services haven’t improved much and there is a lot of waste”.  81% agreed that “if the government reformed public services and cut waste it could make services better and reduce tax at the same time”.

Many of the Conservative Party's most zealous modernisers blame the party's "obsession" with tax cuts for the scale of recent election defeats.  The postscript below offers an alternative explanation for our 2005 defeat but we should certainly not blame 2005's eleventh hour promise of timid tax cuts for our defeat.

At the time The Sun’s Trevor Kavanagh called Oliver Letwin's £4bn tax cut “a drop in the ocean”. Simon Carr of The Independent, studying the modesty of the Tory prospectus, wrote: “no wonder people can’t be bothered.”  The Economist called the Tories cowardly. It accused the Tories of failing to do the job of offering voters an alternative vision of the size and role of the state. An FT editorial declared: “The challenge for the Tories is to draw a clear line between the tax-and-spend, big-government Labour party, and a lower-tax, smaller-state Conservative administration.” The newspaper concluded that Conservatives had fallen well short of achieving that distinction.

IN CONSERVATIVEHOME'S CONTINUING ANALYSIS OF THE TPA/ICM POLL WE WILL...

• At midnight publish the arguments most likely to persuade voters to vote for lower taxation and highlight the scale of the TPA's own ambitions;
• At 10am tomorrow list the taxes that voters most want relief from;
• At 3pm tomorrow we'll publish the major challenges that face Britain and which could form the backdrop for the 2009/ 2010 General Election.

Defensive postscript: People still gave Tony Blair the benefit of the doubt in 2001 and it was an election we couldn't have won.  2005 was different.  A better campaign could have probably deprived him of his majority.  ConservativeHome has always believed - and argued and argued at the time - that the problem in 2005 was a lack of balance.  Michael Howard talked too much about immigration and gypsies but had nothing to say about the inner cities or global poverty.  Conservatives talked about school discipline and dirty hospitals but had nothing to say about the wider problems facing our unreformed public services.  Some of the party's most potent policies were never promoted.  The 'no tuition fees' pledge and the promise to relink the basic state pension with earnings were among the most neglected.   At the eleventh hour we unveiled some tax cuts but they were pretty timid.  But, as Lynton Crosby famously observed, 'you can't fatten a pig on market day.'

Comments

[Jonathan Sheppard]

It will be interesing to see how the poll is written up by tomorrows papers. It seems to confirm that a party can and should focus on its core issues - such as law and order whilst ALSO talking about issues it isnt traditionally seen as being strong in.

[Richard]

This is promising news. We should highlight the fact that taxation is an assault on freedom that takes away the ability of taxpayers to decided how to spend their own money. At best it is a necessary evil but one that should be minimised as much as possible.

This could be combined with a general message of getting the government off of peoples' backs and allowing them more control over their own lives.

[James Maskell]

If all this is a true indication of how the country feels (I have a problem with opinion polls due to its small numbers) then this is what we need to jump start a campaign on low taxes. Osborne should be happy that this poll is coming out.

Im perfectly happy to campaign hard on tax. If it can be balanced with reform of public services, even better. Im willing to campaign for it.

I say this with a warning to the Leadership. If you want tax cuts, or lower taxes, the campaign must start now. In fact its late in the day. I dont want to see a simple win in 2009 or whenever the election is held. I want to see a Slaughter of the Socialists. We must campaign to free people from state control, taxes being a form of this. Come on Cameron. Back a cut in taxes and you will be closer to bringing the right in.

[Voice from the South West]

"New poll suggests Britain is ready to vote for tax relief"

Hooray! :-)

[TopTip]

Lets make sure that our tax cuts favour the poorest. Lets start with a proposal for a huge increase in the tax free income tax allowance.

[Paul Kennedy]

Maybe at the annualised level of the over 21 minimum wage TopTip?

[greg]

What organisations make up the Taxpayers Alliance?

[Mark Senior]

There is surely nothing new in this poll . Have not all previous polls showed that people want lower taxes . The problems and disputes always come when you have to specify what services will be cut to enable taxes to be cut and who gets the bigger share of the tax cuts . Most people will say they deserve the tax cuts more and their services not cut .

[John Coles]

James Maskell says that:
""Osborne should be happy that this poll is coming out.""
Possibly, but expect no action or commitment from him. Instead I fancy he will offer to STUDY the FEASABILITY of a POSSIBLE reduction in tax at SOMETIME in the FUTURE.
Dear God, to be so young and yet so fearful of thinking for himself.

[Patsy Sergeant]

Lawabiding citizens are prepared to pay reasonable taxes (reasonable of course means one thing to one person and quite another to someone else!), provided they can see that they are being put to good use!

This government has been guilty of such ASTRONOMICAL WASTE OF TAXPAYERS MONEY, together with spindoctors who covered up the shambles until they could do so no longer, that a growing majority of the public has lost all confidence in what ANY minister in this government says.

The public in general have become increasingly distrustful of politicians over the years, but it has taken this government, with its cheap newspaper headline policies which prove to be illusory, and its tampering with statistics, that has finally made people realise that it is very INSULTING to the taxpaying public to misuse and waste their taxes. The benefit brigade (one presumes to be the friends of labour), of course would not be bothered one way or the other -- YET, but it will affect even them eventually!

[greg]

The number one priority is for council tax to be reduced, which just happens to be something which is out of central govt hands.

[James Maskell]

John Coles, thats exactly what I am worried about. I doubt Osborne will have the cahones to speak out forcefully enough for tax cuts. He will undoubtly say that the Party is looking into possible tax relief but is awaiting the results of the economic competitiveness Policy Group first, a Policy Group which Im pretty sure Osborne will ignore...

I am skeptical about whether this will happen, but I cant understand why Cameron and Osborne are so scared about even discussing the possibility of tax cuts. Their sharing growth isnt a possibility...its a delaying tactic.

[Denis Cooper]

greg, council tax is far from being outside central government hands. Firstly, council tax can be more or less regarded as the balancing item between what the government tells a council to spend and what the government gives that council in grants to cover that expenditure - with a few bits and bobs from charges for services, parking fines etc. Secondly having set a council that problem to solve, the government then sets an upper limit on their solution. So the government could immediately reduce the proportion of local expenditure which is met by council tax - which is what they've actually done in the Labour heartlands, using tax revenues raised in Tory heartlands ... but really the linked questions of central control of local government activities, and central control of local government finances, should be considered together. Inevitably he who pays the piper will insist on calling the tune.

[Denis Cooper]

Is there any chance that Tory leaders will frankly admit that after the longest and deepest recession since the war, greatly exacerbated and prolonged by the ERM fiasco, the last Tory government left public services in a chronically underfunded and shambolic state, so of course taxation had to rise for a time to try to sort out those problems? But nine years on, and after a lot of money has been spent not very well, now's the time to start easing the tax burden back down to levels which won't cause long term damage to the economy.

[John G]

1) Abolish IHT

2) Cut income tax

3) Rethink Council Tax

4) Abolish CGT

Sure vote-winners.

Let's make it happen!

[TomTom]

Stamp Duty ? Is Osborne nuts ?

That should please those who churn share portfolios but does nothing for the bulk of people - and those who pay IHT plus CGT on assets are left high and dry.............but I suppose Osborne knows what trusts are and resents stamp duty on its investments

[RodS]

A complete No-Brainer. Of course cutting tax is a vote winner and the only way of getting smaller Government. The party leadership is working on out of date polling data which shows voters worried as to where the cuts would come. But the average voter is now"convinced2 that a large proportion of tax income is wasted - and will always be wasted by ANY government.

[michael mcgough]

Stamp Duty ? Is Osborne nuts ?

I think the correct word is challenged with a prefix.He clearly has a great sense of priorities if his first (and only?) tax cut is to stamp duty

[John Moss]

It is interesting to see Labour's response to Osbourne's proposal to cut Stamp Duty on share trading, namely, "that's a £4bn cut in revenue, what services will he cut to pay for it".

This is scare-mongering of course as a 12 year old could probably find £4bn in waste in a week. However, it is important to realise that this is what we face and deal with it properly.

We should be setting out proposals for public service reform, explaining how they would work and what the benefits would be. Once we've got people on board with the ideas of a more liberalised system, with more competition between suppliers and therefore a tendency to reduced costs as well as improved quality - after all, that's what markets deliver - then we can point out that there will be savings over time and then we can cut taxes.

I felt in both 2001 and in 2005 we were approaching this the wrong way round and in saying we would cut £x billion and pay for it this way, laying ourselves open to just the sort of challenge set out above.

We should say what we want to do, work out how much it will cost, then devise the tax regime we need to pay for it. It is far more considered, far easier for people to buy into and far less prone to Labour's attacks. It is, to some extent, what the James Review did.

[Ted]

if Osborne was actually looking at stamp duty primarily as a vote wining tax relief measure then null points. But it is not about tax relief it's about Gordon Brown.

Gordon Brown and Pensions, Gordon Brown and the destruction of private pension schemes, Gordon Brown and his economic legacy.

Osborne plays a cagey game - he's not taking on Gordon Brown as Chancellor but trying to undermine Gordon as potential PM. Re-inforcing the message steadily that Gordon has played fast & loose with your money. He's taken your future prosperity and splurged it on inefficient public service spending.

Like Mike Smithson I think its easy to under-estimate Osborne but he is doing just what many critics say we should do - play the long game to prepare the ground for the election campaign. Rather than put up policies Labour can start now to attack or adopt he's getting to the heart of its incompetence.

[HF]

I am instinctively a tax cutter, but that is sadly not what Voters have in their top 2 priorities.

The informative research produced by Lord Ashcroft after the last GE is essential reading before any debate on tax and voters. Some findings were=
The top issues stated by people that affected their vote were
NHS 58%,
Pension/Social/minwage/poverty = almost 50%, Crime 37%,
Jobs/Growth (about)35%
TAX just under 33%. (44% in Conservative voters)

My view is that IF we are going to advocate tax cuts we need a coherent communications plan to convince Voters that their top 2 priorities (NHS and social issues) are not going to be affected.

More effort needs to be expended more on how to communicate that as we failed to convince the Voters on the past 3 occasions.

As to George Osbourne's share tax cuts, it is the wrong priority. If we need to cut something it should be a tax that everyone agrees will help the low paid. Do the low paid buy shares? 90%+ Do Not. Some of the low paid will benefit from share costs in pensions but that is hidden and difficult to communicate.

[TomTom]

No comment on this finding in that very same poll !!!!

The poll shows strong disillusionment with the main political parties. Only 24% of people identify with the Labour party, 17% with the Tories and 9% with the Liberal Democrats. Four out of 10 people do not identify with any party.

[John G]

As I said before, TomTom, the new Tory support is very "soft"

We ignore that reality at our peril.

[Ted]

Mr Osborne also said (quote from BBCi)

Mr Osborne also told the Sunday Telegraph one of the areas he was looking at now was taking more low paid people out of tax altogether.

He also said he "basically agreed" with Labour former Cabinet minister Stephen Byers, who last week said that inheritance tax should be scrapped, although he could not give "some cast-iron commitment" to abolish it.

NuLabs defence now isn't cuts in Hospitals or Schools but "But the Treasury said: "Anyone who wants to abolish this tax need to explain how to plug the £4bn gap in public finances.

"That's double the amount that we're spending this year on counter-terrorism and security."

Expect a lot more about Tories puttting security at risk through not supporting Govt measures and cutting spending.

[eugene]

Britain desperately needs substantial tax cuts and/or sane redirection of public spending.

Three suggestions:

Petrol is now too costly to be taxed. It makes business costs uncompetitive.

These Gordon Brown hand outs to 18 year olds will in many cases be wasted on wild parties and visits to entertainment complexes- many teenagers are exactly that- teenagers (it is not a negative judgement on them-they all grow out of it). Redirect the money and boost it: BUT it can only be spent on a) Tuition; b) Housing. This will help the housing market, all related business like home builders and help our youngsters get on the housing ladder.

Councils must merge like any big business- and by so doing, cut costs and reduce council tax.

[Thomas Bridge]

I'm not in favour of merging councils - that's effectively a form of centralisation and makes them less responsive to specific local needs.

[Andy Mercer]

Tax cuts are still electoral suicide. In their subconscious, voters still equate cuts in taxes with cuts in services. Every time you talk about tax cuts, you lose another few thousand votes.

There is now a huge payroll vote in the public sector, and they have a high turnout rate. The Conservative Party must attract a proporition of them if it is ever to form a government again. Antagonising potential switch voters, in order placate the core vote is senseless, and would make 2009 a repeat of 1997/2001/2005.

I thought the idea of "one more heave" was done to death in 1914-1918. It seems not.

[TomTom]

"Anyone who wants to abolish this tax need to explain how to plug the £4bn gap in public finances.

Well we currently lose £2.000.000.000 pa to Tax Credit Fraud apparently............we spend £2.000.000.000 on Management Consultancy for HMG.

Then again re-engineering the system should throw off lots of money (let me take charge and I can find lots of spending changes) - let's take the £800 million spent to private the Tube and the fact that PFI bid costs are paid by the Govt.

Let's think about the extra £2.000.000.000 pa Blair offered the EU to support its budget.

Let us remember how much is being filched from The National Lottery to bolster public spending.

Then again, the Govt is paying £300 million to the EU as a penalty for not paying English farmers on time.

How about the £8.000.000.000 spent on Foot & Mouth

We have not considered the £3.000.000.000 support costs for asylum-seekers.

We have not considered the £14.000.000.000 cost of Tax Credits............nor the £6.000.000.000 subsidy to Network Rail

[TomTom]

Councils must merge like any big business- and by so doing, cut costs and reduce council tax.

No they should demerge to cut costs.........smaller is cheaper with far fewer grandiose posts

[John G]

Hear! Hear!

And let's start by getting rid of the utterly wasteful and idiotic London Assembly.

Nothing would please me more then to see that appalling anti-Semitic extremist Livingstone back in the trashcan where Maggie put him.

That's why we need a mayoral candidate committed to abolishing the whole caboodle.

Nick Ferrari?

[Denis Cooper]

Councils are not "businesses", they're part of our democratic system. There are costs associated with running a democratic system, but the costs of not having democracy are always infinitely higher in the end.

[John G]

No need for a London Assemby though John.

The London Boroughs can be relied upon to do the job. No need for duplication.

[Denis Cooper]

I reckon it's very sensible to have a democratic body covering the whole of the metropolis. If at present it's dominated by Livingstone, whose fault is that?

[changetowin]

The Conservatives must never again make the mistake of Hague, IDS and Howard. All three leaders began by talking the modernising talk and ending by a lurch to the right.

The party has a strategy and it is working. We must stick to it. If we don't, the media and the electorate will conclude that all the talk of change was just talk. Of course, we have to argue that over time it is better if the proceeds of growth are shared between tax relief and public spending. BUT the sort of sweeping tax cuts that people here seem to want are quite a different matter.

Yes, voters are going to say in a poll that they want to pay less tax. Of course they do. But they still don't identify with us and will mistrust our motives for cutting taxes. If we suddenly turn round and promise sweeping tax cuts people will rightly ask why we've suddenly become less cautious. Was all the talk of stability first just rubbish?

The Conservatives have a strategy which was approved by the party membership by a margin of 2-1. We must have a full economic policy that is not merely about how much tax we can cut. We need to rebuild our shattered reputation for economic competence, stability and concern about public services. As the economy grows we will return some of this growth to the public in the form of tax cuts. This is a long term strategy, which in the long term will actually allow us to offer tax relief in government. It also recognises the reality that reforming public services may be expensive at first.

People may want tax relief, but the evidence is they have not wanted it from people they do not trust. (just as the public liked our policy on immigration, but didn't like it when they heard it was associated with the Conservatives).

I say stick to our strategy and don't allow yourself to be blown of course no matter how loud the bleats are from those who believe that our problem in 2005 was that we weren't right wing enough on tax! Strategy should not be altered for opinion polls that offer no new insight.

[John G]

Be honest changetowin. You're not a dispassionate observer but a committed "wet" who wants (naturally enough) to see the party move in your direction.

Your attitude on the EU alone should be sufficient to make staunch Tories very suspicious of your motives.

Sadly, history shows that your approach has failed, while the robust Toryism of Margaret Thatcher set a gold standard which can probably not be equalled, let alone surpassed.

Of course certain changes were necessary. Less snobbery; reaching out to council estates and tower blocks; understanding the worries of ordinary working people. All these have been neglected in the past.

True, we have to overcome our reputation for economic incompetence but that cannot be achieved until David moves young Master Oborne to some relatively junior role more in line with the level of his talents.