A Treasury minister refused to rule out further tax rises before the next general election despite a report concluding the tax burden is on course to rise by more in the current parliament than during any other since the Second World War.
Andrew Griffith, the Economic Secretary to the Treasury, was asked this morning if he could commit to no further tax rises by the current Government in the wake of the Institute for Fiscal Studies’ report, but he was unable to do so.
He told Times Radio: “Look, I don’t think any responsible Treasury minister is going to give you that commitment.
“I can point to what the proud track record of Conservative governments are, the fact that philosophically we believe that you need a strong economy, you need to build that on stable foundations, which is why inflation, bearing down on that, is so important. That’s been the priority the Prime Minister set.
“We’re on track to deliver that because of the tough choices we’ve made. Directionally, Conservatives believe in people keeping more of their own money. But I regret I can’t give you a commitment at seven o’clock outside of a fiscal event as to the specifics of that.
“But it’s clearly something that is a consequence of that really significant extra amount of money no one planned for, no one foresaw due to the global pandemic.”
