Tax hikes won't hit 'modest incomes', minister pledges

Labour has left the door open to higher taxes on the middle classes in Rachel Reeves's crunch Budget later this year.

- KATE DEVLIN WHITEHALL EDITOR

Transport secretary Heidi Alexander would not rule out tax rises in a series of interviews yesterday morning, but said the government had pledged not to hike them for “people on modest incomes”.

Asked if the public should expect taxes to go up in the autumn, she said ministers would be guided by “fairness”.

She also told Sky News’s Sunday Morning With Trevor Phillips that cabinet ministers did not “directly” talk about the idea of a wealth tax — being pushed by unions and former Labour leader Lord Neil Kinnock - during an away day at the prime minister’s Chequers country estate on Friday.

The shadow home secretary, Chris Philp, said her comments “sound to me like a barely disguised reference to tax rises coming in the autumn”.