Harriet Baldwin MP, Chair Treasury Select Committee, said on Woman’s Hour this week that her number one recommendation to the Chancellor for the Spring Budget would be to change the Child Benefit system.  This is a massive turnaround and exciting for MAHM who via Miriam Cates MP and in cooperation with Tax & the Family sent briefing papers to Harriet.

Despite the reductions to tax announced in today’s Autumn Statement, total tax revenue as a share of GDP remains to reach its highest level since the 1940s. This is due to the freezing of tax thresholds and high inflation which means that many more families are being pushed into paying tax and increasingly the high rate of tax. 

Tax & The Family and Mothers At Home Matter write to The Guardian: Jeremy Hunt, the latest Chancellor, said that the Government should be compassionate, with those who are struggling. At a time of growing in-work poverty he should consider tax changes which benefit the least well-off — in particular those in poverty with incomes of less than 60% of the median; those where one parent stays at home to look after children or care for a relative; and those with large families.

Mothers At Home Matter and Tax & The Family are highly critical of today’s announcement by the Chancellor of the Exchequer to abolish the 45p rate and advance to the reduction to 19p in the basic rate of tax next year. He is focussing the tax reductions on those with higher incomes, while very largely ignoring those who pay income tax even though they are in poverty