Abolishing the 10p tax rate

Labour stands for social justice or it stands for nothing. That is why the very real prospect of some of the least affluent families facing a virtual doubling in their tax bill under a LABOUR Government is indefensible.

Yet that is what will happen when the 10p income tax band is abolished - a move announced in the 2007 budget but which will come into law with the passing of this year's Finance Bill. Anyone earning over £18,000 will be unaffected or indeed better-off with the abolition of the 10p band, because the quid-pro-quo of that abolition was the reduction of the 22p tax band down to 20p.

But everyone who currently only pays income tax at the 10p rate will now find that they are paying 20% tax - and that means pensioners, part time workers and low income workers. In other words, three of the core groups Labour exists to serve.

I recently had a letter from a pensioner under 65 who lives in a West Hill council estate; someone who receives a basic state pension plus pension credit; but who also receives a small private pension that takes her income above the tax threshold. The extra amount of tax she'll now have to pay is not vast: but should she be paying any more when people earning over £35,000 are going to be paying less? Of course not. When other bills and food prices are rising? Of course not.

When you are in the wrong it is a virtue, not a vice, to admit it. The Government is in that situation right now. Unfortunately it does not appear to be willing to do so on this critical issue. The responsibility for holding the Labour Government to Labour ideals therefore falls to the backbenches: the MPs that give Labour its majority in the House of Commons.

I understand the difficulty normally loyal backbench Labour MPs are now in: I am not standing to be your Labour MP to go to Westminster and then habitually vote against a Labour Government. So in no way do I underestimate the dilemma loyal Labour backbenchers face - and the distaste voting down our own government leaves them with - it's the same for me.

But the government is wrong on this and if it refuses to back down or rectify its mistake - as they have said they will not, I can see no purpose, merit or honour in being a Labour MP if that role is to make life harder for the least affluent, the pensioners and the part-time workers of Putney.