A Channel 5 news journalist was booed Tuesday at the Labour manifesto launch as Jeremy Corbyn introduced his hard-left Labour plan, which includes a £50 billion tax hike to fund public spending.
Launching his party’s manifesto “for the many, not the few” at Bradford University, Mr. Corbyn committed to spending nearly £50 billion on boosting education and social care paid for by £48.6 billion worth of tax rises on high-earners, wealthy individuals, big businesses, and the City.
Yet his manifesto was light on detail on immigration plans. During questions from the press, Channel 5 news political editor Andy Bell acknowledged that while Mr. Corbyn did not want to set an immigration target, he asked whether he thought “it would be good for the country if the immigration level was reduced”.
The question was not well received in the room and was met with a chorus of boos from the audience, which had to be silenced by Labour leader Corbyn who called for “respect… including for members of the media”, and reminded the hecklers that he himself was also a member of the National Union of Journalists.
I asked Jeremy Corbyn if reducing immigration would be good for UK – didn't answer directly but stressed immigrant contribution #GE2017
— Andy Bell (@andybell5news) May 16, 2017
Also booed was a journalist from the left wing tabloid The Mirror, who said a poll of readers found policies from the leaked manifesto were popular, but Mr. Corbyn as leader was not. Asking if the Labour leader might explain why that was, the audience again reacted with boos.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A5AyTDL1fTQ
The most left wing manifesto in decades promised two streams of spending: “current spending”, such as on schools and the NHS, and the ” National Transformation Fund” which includes cross-rail expansion and the renationalisation of utilities and services such as Royal Mail and rail networks.
Spending commitments include free further education tuition, removing university tuition fees and restoring maintenance grants, increased spending on health and social care, and recruiting an additional 10,000 police officers.
The Labour leader pledged to pay for these spending commitments by increasing income tax on the “richest 5 per cent of high earners”, raising Corporation Tax to 26 per cent, introducing a 0.5 per cent so-called ‘Robin Hood tax’ on financial transactions, and lowering the threshold for the 45p additional rate to £80, 000 and reintroducing the 50p rate on earnings above £123,000, equalling £48.6 billion.
Overall Government budgets would increase by 10 per cent.
However, Sky News’s Ed Conway’s analysis of the figures suggests that whilst the near £50 billion in spending is offset by the tax rises, the National Transformation Fund, which seeks to renationalise the National Grid, Royal Mail, energy utilities, water, and rail, is not.
“Where there’s is a big question over the National Transformation Fund,” Conway said.
“This will cost tens of billions of pounds. Labour has said that this will come from investment out of borrowing.”
Noting that the manifesto says the Fund “will invest £250 billion over ten years”, Conway commented: “That will raise the national debt an awful lot.
“Although the current spending won’t be paid for out of taxpayers’ pockets, this will be paid for by future generations because more debt has to be paid for eventually.”
Questions about the National Transformation Fund were also raised by Andrew Neil on Daily Politics. Mr. Neil asked Shadow Transport Secretary Andy McDonald, speaking from Bradford, how this radical renationalisation would be funded, with Neil pointing out that Thames Water alone is worth £12 billion.
Mr. McDonald was unable to answer, rather saying “the money will come for that in the fullness of time”, and those aspects of the manifesto were “an ambition commitment”.
Institute for Fiscal Studies think tank director Paul Johnson also cast doubt on the ability of a Labour Government to raise the £50 billion to pay for tuition fees and police officers.
“They are suggesting a £50 billion increase in tax, which if it were to be implemented would take the tax burden in this country to the highest level it’s been in about 70 years,” he told the BBC.
“But, actually I think there’s an awful lot of uncertainty about whether you could actually raise that amount of tax. They’re talking about very, very large increases in taxes on companies which would likely reduce the amount of investment that they do.
“So I think the actual amount you could get from these policies – it certainly runs into the tens of billions – but probably doesn’t reach the £50 billion that Labour are claiming.”
On BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer John McDonnell admitted Labour does not know how much it would cost to renationalise the water industry, and did not know the country’s current deficit before incorrectly telling presenter Nick Robinson it was “£68 to £70 billion”- the figure for 2015-16, rather than this current period’s figure of £52 billion.
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