Farage says substantial tax cuts ‘not realistic’

Nigel Farage said substantial tax cuts were “not realistic at this current moment in time” as he pledged Reform UK would lead the “most pro-business” government in modern history.

The Reform UK leader used a speech in London on Monday to promise sweeping deregulation, arguing the UK had “squandered” Brexit.

He said the party would remove inheritance tax from family farms and family-run businesses and would “raise the thresholds at which people start to pay tax”.

If elected, Reform UK would “substantially cut the benefits bill” and “reduce the size of the public sector”, with Mr Farage adding that all disability claims would be reassessed and “dealt with in person”.

Speaking at Banking Hall in the City of London, Mr Farage said: “We want to cut taxes, of course we do, but we understand substantial tax cuts given the dire state of debt and our finances are not realistic at this current moment in time.

“There are some relatively modest things we would do: We would immediately remove IHT from family farms and from family-run businesses, and we will raise the thresholds at which people start to pay tax to begin the process of getting people out of the 16-hour a week working debt trap that so many people find themselves in.”

The Reform UK leader added: “One of my own great frustrations is that Brexit has been squandered. The opportunity to sensibly deregulate, the opportunity to become competitive globally, all of that has been squandered.

“And the worst thing is that regulations and the way regulators behave with British business is now worse than it was at the time of the Brexit referendum vote.”

He also said: “We will become the most pro-business, pro-entrepreneurship government that has been seen in this country in modern times.

“We will bring into government as advisers or ministers, people with real business expertise in their own sector.”

Mr Farage predicted there would be a general election “caused by economic collapse” in 2027.

He added: “I want as many high-earning people as possible living in this country and paying as much tax as they legally have to, because if the rich leave and the rich don’t pay tax, then the poorer in society will all have to pay more tax.”

Mr Farage said Reform UK was “not a one-man band” but had a “broadening team”.

Reform’s manifesto had committed the party to tax cuts worth around a third of the NHS budget, including raising the personal allowance to £20,000, introducing a £100,000 tax-free allowance for companies and exempting some high street firms from business rates.

At the time, the Institute for Fiscal Studies said the plans, along with £50 billion of spending commitments and £150 billion of cuts, were “problematic” and cost far more than Reform claimed.

Labour said Mr Farage’s new proposals would “take us back to austerity”.

A party spokesperson said: “We’ve seen from the councils Reform run that they’ve failed to deliver the savings they already promised and are cutting services and raising taxes as a result.

“They’ve said themselves that those councils are a shop window for what a Reform government would do nationally – we know that this is more empty promises and no real plan.”

Conservative shadow chancellor Sir Mel Stride said Reform could not be taken seriously on the economy “when their promises disintegrate after five minutes, and they remain committed to extra welfare spending and a huge expansion of the state”.

He said: “They are a one-man band and have resorted to junking promises they made only recently in a desperate attempt to appear economically credible.

“In local government they have failed to find savings and are instead planning tax hikes on hard-working families.”