Number 10 prepares for battle over National Insurance rise to fund social care
Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak are set to face internal backlash over the pair’s plan to rise National Insurance to pay for NHS rise and social care reform.
The pair are expected to unveil the “NHS and Social Care Levy” next week as parliament resumes, which will see employee and employer National Insurance Contributions increase by between 1 and 1.25 per cent.
The new policy announcement would see the NHS given an extra £34bn to help combat Covid-linked increases to NHS waiting lists.
It will also contribute to the government’s plan to cap individual social care costs at £80,000 in a bid to fix the country’s social care crisis.
However, the plan would see Johnson break his 2019 election promise to not increase income tax, National Insurance and VAT and is attracting fierce backlash from Tory MPs.
A cabinet minister told the Sunday Telegraph that increasing National Insurance, which would hit the lowest wage earners the hardest, would be “economically and politically wrong”.
“It kicks in at a low level and there are all kinds of exemptions which benefit the rich. If you get all your income from investments and property you don’t pay a penny but if you work your guts out for minimum wage you get clobbered,” they said.
“After all that’s happened in the last 18 months they can’t seriously be thinking about a tax raid on supermarket workers and nurses so the children of Surrey homeowners can receive bigger inheritances.”
Senior Conservative backbenchers like Steve Baker and Iain Duncan Smith have also hit out at the proposals, while Labour is set to oppose the tax hike.
Speaking to the BBC today, shadow foreign secretary Lisa Nandy: “We’re skeptical about loading the entire burden of the social care crisis on to supermarket workers and lorry drivers who are already dealing with really high housing costs, child care costs and others.
“I thought the Prime Minister understood that, I thought when he said he was going to fix social care that he was going to come forward with a proper plan working with other political parties.”