by Penny Hampden-Turner Following a relatively light King’s Speech, many are naturally looking to Labour’s policies to see how they contrast. One potential pledge from Labour has pricked the ears of parents who have children in, or are planning to send children to, private school. This is Labour’s promise... Read more...
By Jonathan Eida, researcher Tuesday marked King Charles’ first King’s Speech. Amongst all the pageantry came the political agenda for the coming months. There was little for households bearing the weight of a 70-year high tax burden to feel overly enthusiastic about, but here are four things that stood... Read more...
by Benjamin Elks, operations manager The World Health Organisation seems to be compensating for recent failings over COVID-19 by focusing on inconsequential, trivial issues, much like an overzealous parent. In the current climate of increasing tobacco restrictions, some may not be surprised to learn that the WHO is advocating... Read more...
by Elliot Keck, head of campaigns It’s safe to say that the covid inquiry this week has been more heat than light. It’s been entertaining for sure, and more expletive-laden than an episode of Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares. But what have we really learnt? It’s difficult to argue with... Read more...
Taxes aren’t going up, the chancellor insists. That would be difficult to stomach at any point, but particularly during a cost of living crisis, when the tax burden is one of the biggest strains on household budgets. It’s made even worse when there’s endless reports of the enormous waste that... Read more...
By: Joanna Marchong, intern at the TaxPayers' Alliance The Tax Foundation has published its updated figures for the annual International Tax Competitiveness Index. The purpose of the report is to compare and rank how well OECD countries promote economic growth and investment through competitiveness, dictated by the effectiveness of... Read more...
By Benjamin Elks, operations manager When the prime minister stood up at the Conservative Party Conference, he promised to set out his vision of change for the country. Perhaps the most radical proposal from Sunak was a plan to create a “smoke free generation” with the age for... Read more...
This week, the TPA team travelled up to Manchester to host this year’s ThinkTent; an annual array of panel discussions and interviews hosted in conjunction with the Institute of Economic Affairs across Conservative Party Conference. Here are some of the highlights picked out by our team members from three days... Read more...
by Conor Holohan, media campaign manager Once the TPA gang had finished loading up the van destined for Conservative Party Conference in Manchester with boxes of our lights, cameras and microphones, we returned to our desks, slightly out of breath, to some alarming news. The Institute for Fiscal... Read more...
By Howard Cox, founder of FairFuelUK and London mayoral candidate for Reform UK This week’s pronouncement by Rishi Sunak in moving the sales ban of new diesel and petrol cars from 2030 to 2035 is a welcome reprise from the years of relentless political pressure on the motorist. It... Read more...
By: Jeremy Havardi, director of B'nai B'rith The foreign secretary, James Cleverly, had numerous issues to discuss with his counterparts while visiting Israel and the Palestinian Territories this week. As always, security would have been high on the agenda. Recent years have seen an alarming rise in the number... Read more...
The summer months were quiet for some, but not for the TPA’s war on waste campaign. We continued to uncover shocking examples of wasted taxpayers’ cash, right across the public sector. As holiday-makers were jetting off on their holidays, we revealed in a front-page story that a second prime... Read more...
By Jonathan Eida, researcher Sadiq Khan’s ultra low emissions zone (ULEZ) expanded to cover all London boroughs this week. This regressive levy will cost drivers £12.50 a day and will not make significant headway in terms of cleaning up London’s air. Khan should be up front and admit that... Read more...
By: Olivia O'Mahony, intern at the TaxPayers' Alliance We at the TaxPayers' Alliance have written to every council leader across the UK to ask them to pledge not to introduce a four-day week for staff during their leadership. Taxpayers deserve reassurance that they won’t be paying for a part-time... Read more...
By: Conor Holohan, media campaign manager at the TaxPayers' Alliance There has been no shortage of MP scandals in recent years. Fifteen MPs are currently whipless for a range of alleged reasons, some of which are of the headline-grabbing variety. By-elections have also been held after MPs chose to... Read more...
By: Callum McGoldrick, intern at the TaxPayers' Alliance The International Monetary Fund (IMF) was founded in 1944 at least initially to ensure economic stability and cooperation between nations. In an era before floating exchange rates, the most important element of this was setting fixed exchange rates and providing short-term... Read more...
by Olivia O'Mahony, intern Over the last few months, the TaxPayer’s Alliance has been on the road on our annual Town Hall Rich List Roadshow. We visited 6 of the worst offending councils, chatting to locals in Guilford, Dorchester, Sheffield, Kidderminster, Cardiff and Sunderland. While each area has its... Read more...
By: Callum McGoldrick, intern at the TaxPayers' Alliance Founded in 1944, the World Bank’s original focus was post-war reconstruction and development. Early loans were targeted at European states recovering from war, but from 1947 the World Bank turned its gaze outward and in 1948 Chile became the first non-European... Read more...
By Joe Ventre, digital campaign manager Last month, the debate over the licence fee and the future of the BBC reared its head once again, following reports that a formal review of Auntie’s funding model would be announced this autumn. These reports surfaced only a week after the release... Read more...
by Olivia O'Mahony, intern Education is where opportunity is born, or so we are told. Yet, after schools locked their doors and children swapped classrooms for covid lockdowns, the return to the school gates has been an inefficient exercise. Schools are currently facing a crisis, and a costly... Read more...
By: Callum McGoldrick, intern at the TaxPayers' Alliance The World Health Organisation (WHO) was founded in 1948, its focus was on the monitoring and prevention of the prevalent diseases of the day, notably malaria and tuberculosis. Unlike many of the quangos which emerged at the end of the second... Read more...
It was clear blue skies and a beating hot sun for much of June. Plenty of reasons to bunk off work. Taxpayers will certainly wonder if that’s what civil servants were doing in June, given some of the stories we uncovered in our war on waste campaign. Shockingly, many... Read more...
By: Mike Denham, chairman of the TaxPayers' Alliance The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) is not given to hysterical exaggeration, so when they describe the outlook for government finances as “alarming” we should all be worried. And taxpayers should be especially worried. At over 100 percent of GDP,... Read more...
By: Callum McGoldrick, intern at the TaxPayers' Alliance Higher education costs taxpayers £9.4 billion a year in the form of unpaid student loans alone, but the true cost is much greater. An under-reported cost of higher education is the millions pumped into quangos whose main job is to ‘aid’... Read more...