Chancellor refuses to rule out more property taxes
Rachel Reeves told MPs on the Treasury Select Committee that she had "narrowed the gap" between earning from work and income from property.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves has refused to rule out new property levies just two weeks after the Budget which saw landlords paying more tax.
Reeves also introduced a ‘mansion tax’ on properties valued at more than £2 million in her statement at the end of last month.
Now, she has told MPs there was gap between people earning from work and those receiving income from property, which had now been “narrowed”.
I think that is the right thing to do…we got the balance right in the Budget on that.”
“What I did in the Budget was to increase by two percentage points, the basic rates on dividend, savings and property income, and made some changes to the additional and higher rates as well,” she told the Treasury Select Committee.
Landlords will now have to pay 22% in income tax (up from 20%) on rental income, and 42% and 47% at higher rates.
“I think that is the right thing to do,” she said. “A two-percentage point increase is quite a big increase in the tax rate on any form of income, but I think we got the balance right in the Budget on that.”
Go further
The Chancellor did not introduce National Insurance on rental income as some predicted. And she was asked if she intended to go further in the future and increase tax on property income.
“Well, obviously, if you go out to work, you pay National Insurance, and you don’t pay National Insurance on other forms of income, but we have taken action in this budget to narrow the gap between those different forms of income.”
