Green co-leader rejects Liz Truss comparison over borrowing

Published

3 months ago

June 20, 2024

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The co-leader of the Greens has rejected comparisons with Liz Truss for proposing to borrow COVID levels of money to fund his party’s manifesto programme.

Adrian Ramsay, who leads the Greens alongside Carla Denyer, did not reject that his party would spend £325bn over the course of the parliament to invest in public services.

But speaking to Sophy Ridge, Sky News’ lead politics presenter, Mr Ramsay denied the suggestion his proposals could be likened to those put forward by the former prime minister whose economic plans unravelled and forced her from office.

According to the House of Commons library, the total cost of the government’s COVID-19 measures ranges from about £310bn to £410bn.

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The numbers in the Green Party’s manifesto were crunched by Sky News economics editor Ed Conway and total £325bn.

Put to him that his party could borrow that figure to fund spending, Mr Ramsay said: “Our proposal is that over the course of the parliament, the extra spending that we would have on day-to-day spending would be funded by increased day-to-day taxes.”

He added: “This is money that’s being borrowed for investment. Investment in things like our school buildings that are crumbling, hospital buildings.”

The Green Party’s manifesto, launched last week, promised to “mend broken Britain” through a programme of investment paid for by the “very richest” in society.

It includes a 1% annual wealth tax on assets above £10m and 2% on assets above £1bn, along with reforms to Capital Gains Tax to align with workers’ income tax, and removing the upper earnings limit on national insurance.

The Greens believe this could raise up to £70bn a year, with their plans to introduce a carbon tax adding another £80bn to the government’s coffers.

But unlike some of their rivals, the Greens have also made clear they are “prepared to borrow to invest”, rather than be “trapped by a self-imposed fiscal straitjacket”.

Challenged on the choice of language – which Ridge said mirrored that used by Ms Truss – Mr Ramsay said the key difference with the former Tory leader was that she “borrowed to give tax breaks to the very richest in society”.

“We’re talking about investing in a future that will be better for everybody,” he argued.

“And we need to bring about those changes because we have high levels of inequality. We have changes in the climate that are running away with themselves. And the climate experts are always, always very clear. The costs of not acting on the climate emergency are far greater than the costs of acting.”

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Mr Ramsay also defended increasing tax on people earning more than £50,000 by changing national insurance for those who earn over that threshold.

“Our proposal is that national insurance is changed so that everybody pays the same percentage of their salary on national insurance, regardless of what they earn,” he said.

“I’m not saying £50,000 is too high a salary,” he added.

“Someone earning £55,000 on our proposals would pay £5 extra a week, but let’s look at what they’d get for that – because at the moment we have a situation where people are forking out for a private dentist because there’s no access to NHS dentists, they’re paying exorbitant rail fares, they’re paying high energy and food bills.

“Green proposals are about tackling the cost of living crisis, and the causes of why people are having to fork out those things, and we’d all be better off overall if we put the investment in.”

You can watch the full interview with Adrian Ramsay on the Politics Hub with Sophy Ridge from 7pm on Thursday.

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Lisa Nandy says Sir Keir Starmer ‘very sensible’ to accept football tickets worth thousands

Published

7 hours ago

September 21, 2024

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Lisa Nandy says Sir Keir Starmer 'very sensible' to accept football tickets worth thousands

Lisa Nandy has said Sir Keir Starmer’s decision to accept thousands of pounds worth of football tickets was “very sensible”.

The minister for culture, media and sport also said she had never accepted free clothes from a donor.

Speaking to Sky News at the start of the Labour Party conference today, the MP for Wigan said: “The problem that has arisen since [Sir Keir] became leader of the opposition and then prime minister is that for him to sit in the stands would require a huge security detail, would be disruptive for other people and it would cost the taxpayer a lot of money.

“So I think he’s taken a very sensible decision that’s not the right and appropriate thing to do, and it’s right to accept that he has to go and sit in a different area.

“But I know that he’d much rather be sitting in the stands cheering people on with the usual crowd that he’s been going to the football with for years.”

Ms Nandy also said while she has not accepted free clothes – joking “I think you can probably see that I choose my own clothes sadly” – she doesn’t “make any judgements about what other members of parliament do”.

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She said: “The only judgement I would make is if they’re breaking the rules, so they’re trying to hide what they’re doing. That’s when problems arise.

“Because the point of being open and transparent is that people can see where the relationships are, and they can then judge for themselves whether there’s been any undue influence.”

She asserted there had not been an undue influence in gifts accepted by senior Labour figures, adding: “We don’t want the news and the commentary to be dominated by conversations about clothes.

“We rightly have a system, I think, where the taxpayer doesn’t fund these things. We don’t claim on expenses for them. And so MPs will always take donations, will always take gifts in kind.

“MPs of all political parties have historically done that and that is the system that we have.”

She added: “I don’t think there’s any suggestion here that Keir Starmer has broken any rules. I don’t think there’s any suggestion that he’s done anything wrong.

“We expect our politicians to be well turned out, we expect them to be people who go out and represent us at different events and represent the country at different events and are clothed appropriately.

“But the point is that when we accept donations for that or for anything else, that we declare them and we’re open and transparent about them.”

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Sir Keir, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves said yesterday they will no longer accept donations in the future to pay for clothes.

The announcement followed criticism of Sir Keir’s gifts from donors, which included clothing worth £16,200 and multiple pairs of glasses worth £2,485, according to the MPs’ register of interests.

The register shows Ms Rayner has accepted clothing donations to the value of £2,230.

Sky News also revealed the scale of Sir Keir’s donations this week as part of our Westminster Accounts investigation.

Sir Keir was found to have received substantially more gifts and freebies than any other MP – his total in gifts, benefits, and hospitality topped £100,000 since December 2019.