Joe I wonder if they would increase it across the board, or target certain goods and services.
How it affects various sections of society might depend on which items it is imposed.

I have just posted this in another Thread..........Also heard on the news today that although the winter fuel payments MAY not be reduced just yet, we should expect that they will be.

Now this really angers me, especially with the rise in fuel prices........Poor bloody pensioners shat on again.

Sorry!

It angers me tbh, pensioners should be looked after! Most of them have worked hard all their life and left on the breadline after all that

Well Jen we will have to see....but I have no doubt the new Con-dem wont let us down

I've also heard that free bus passes will be scrapped ...........it may be scaremongering - but who knows? It's a shame - my old mum has been 'comfortable' these last few years ...........it's criminal to target the old IMO.

My Dad said a couple of weeks ago at a party that when the tories are in power the first thing they will do is rise VAT.

Everyone then turned around to him in disgust and said "you think you know everything!". Won't be hearing from them again

The thing is - it'll not only hurt everyday folk but also small business who will have to put up their prices. I really dont understand how hiking up VAT helps the economy TBH. I know for a fact that our business will suffer ............I'll never forget when VAT was introduced into our line of business in the early eighties ................it very near scuppered us.

Us too! For what it's worth in monetary terms I  spend too long dealing with it.

The truth is the tories are more concerned about paying off the debts than anyone elses lives.  I see they made a 5% cut on what they earn... simply to make themselves look good. When really to me, they come across quite desperate... 5% of how much exactly? £100k+?

So far I also seen every MP that has had an interview say its going to be tough because of the way labour have left it, can see they have their excuses ready for when they fail to make the real big difference.

I asked Lal to do a sweep on when this would be mentioned.

Tell me about it! Unpaid tax collectors . I think I've buggered up this quarter - apparently can only do it online now ....still haven't got it sorted - I've got till the end of the month. What about people who haven't got a copmputer or who have no idea?

No point being angry about wild speculation...

SSSSHHHHHH! FFS they have eyes and ears everywhere.  If you want any assistance/advice - I've been doing it online for a coupla years. Do you do four columns  either side btw?

We knew it was coming, more than anything Clegg banged on about VAT for weeks, Cameron denied it for weeks and if it goes through Clegg will have agreed to it! The winter fuel payments were always going to be in danger, maybe if the public shout long and hard enough the pensioners will get a easier ride. I can't even discuss it that much, I'm fuming. We knew whatever party got it we were in for a tough ride, but as always with the tories it's the poorer end of the scale that are always much worse off. I despair that we'll never have a fair society while they hold power.

Is it that wild though .................when pushed on the subject (during the run up) Cameron simply wouldn't commit on this .......he was far more interested in raising the inheritance threshold to give some dosh to the rich. Talk about robbing the poor to pay the rich . At least Nick and co have got him to climb down on that one (for the time being anyway).

Errrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr what? Now you've got me scared!

Kinda like Labour use to blame things because of "tory boom and bust" and how the Labour party would never let the country return to those days.  We all know those apirations failed miserably.


The fact is, blaming the previous administration is an easy excuse, but they all seem to do it anyway.  After all, the new government haven't been in power long enough for the state of the economy to be blamed on them!  This will no doubt remain the case for the next while yet.

It was speculated for weeks before the election, Cameron denied and Clegg was dead against it. Mind, that was before he got his deputy PM job with a party that had very few seats  

He did comment, although not conclusively.  He said they had "no plans in increasing VAT".  Until I hear otherwise, from the government, I'm not going to get worried or angry about things which seem to have no real basis of fact.

Sorry! I have to go soon aswell.
I could never work out how to do it and bespoke account books are rubbish! So I bought a 10X8 exercise book. Open pages. Left one Income, right one outgoings, each with 4 columns. Gross. Vatable. Vat. Net. I fill 'em in accordingly. It's  dead easy to tot 'em up.
I should point out that less than half of our sales are vatable.

As far as I'm aware no party categorically denied that VAT would be raised. They all chose their words carefully, without being definite - as they do.
Most economic people were seeing a VAT rise as a strong possibility.

And please don't lets try to pretend that we are not in a terrible position financially, we have massive debts, not much below Greece's actually, it has to be sorted and we always knew that.  Far too early to start screeching surely.

I agree... well I would wouldn't I VAT  was only put down last year on a temporary basis... and like Spider says.... until it has been confirmed this particular  voter isn't going to get into a *debate* about it

I think they should look at other ways to raise money Like stop Family Allowance for over 50 k earners....I think its disgraceful that millionaires and very high earners can claim this.


Richard Bransons wife for one was quite open about the fact they claimed this.

I do something very similar - Vatable, Zero, Total and actual VAT. Takings added up separately .............recently handed it all over to new accountant ............but still do a lot of the donkey work. It's not easy trusting someone after doing it all for thirty years! I just need to register online that's all and haven't got around to doing it.

if they raise the  income tax threshold , the poorer in society will have some protection when vat is raised, it's just another way of reallocating some of the burden.

if tax bands are raised to 10k it will save the poorest families £700 a year if vat is raised to 20% it will cost the average family £500,of course the amount we hand over in vat will depend on how much we lash out in the shops,so the overall saving should come out as higher for the poorer families.

is this the universal child benefit?

just about everyone  has said that it would cost more to administer than it would save.

but i'm thinking that now we have the tax credits offices, it would be fairly simple to administer.

btw, when gordon reduced vat by 2.5% during the  crissi, just about everyone i spoke to and heard on the tellybox, said what a waste of time that was and the saving was  hardly noticeable.
so cant really see if it's raised by 2.5% why those same people would be so outraged, myself.

As an accountant I follow various accounting and tax websites and the general concensus of views is that the VAT rate will be increased to 20%. The chances are that this would have been done at the last budget but was politically impossible just before the general election. Whether the rate is increased at the first budget this summer or postponed for a few months is not known. However it is likely that those who are on low incomes will be helped hopefully by the re-introduction of the starting 10% tax rate.

well the 10% tax rise wont help people who are on benefits due to disability, redundancy etc, so the Vat rise will hit them hard

A lot of what is being proposed is aimed at hitting those who earn fairly highly.  They are planning, in due time, to make the first £10,000 tax free which obviously is great for those who earn the least, I know its very expensive to do this but at least they are planning it.  Trouble is when you find yourself heavily in debt, as we are, then belt tightening can be unavoidable.  At least if they can turn it around, still a big ask, and the Bank of England seems to approve so far, then hopefully we can avoid the dreadful spectre of what Greece is going through.  I heard on Radio 4 this morning that many Greek doctors have not paid taxes for years.  They will now be chased for this money and it comes to something like £21bn

I agree that benefits such as the child benefit that every family recieves should not be paid to families who earn over a certain amount. However, in the same way that all families are not in the same financial position, neither are ALL pensioners. My 82yr old Grandad has said that he would happily do without his heating allowance and free tv license and buss pass etc if it meant the money could be better used elsewhere. He, along with my parents and my in-laws along with many other pensioners have plenty of savings and good pensions etc, so surely their 'benefits' should be means tested too?? This is something a fair few of the pensioners that I know actually agree with. They are fortunate enough to have saved hard etc and are financially secure, so why do they need hand outs that could help those who are not so fortunate? I realise that many, many pensioners are not in the same position as the ones I have mentioned and obvioulsly, their need is greater....but not all pensioners are badly off! Just an idea that has been discussed quite a bit in RL here!

If the government raise VAT to 20%.....then they should do something about fuel prices for everyone. The winter fuel allowance doesn't cover half the bill for an elderly person to start with....and many, many people struggle to pay for various reasons. I don't think that life's necessities should be subject to VAT in the first place.

i agree vat should never have been put on domestic fuel in the first place, is it still at a lower rate than the 17.5%, as it used to be?

the vat rise to 20% doesn't affect food, or childrens clothing anyway.I do think there is an argument for producing a stained diesel as they do in ireland , i believe, for commercial and farm vehicles, which attracts a lower rate of vat.

as far as those on incapactiy benefits and pensions, as mentioned above, not all pensioners are  in poverty, i dont know how much the basic state pension is  or the current incapacity benefit, but im guessing its not a lot.An increase of 2.5% would really affect large ticket items, white goods, cars,electrical goods, and the techy toys etc.if pensions and incapacity benefits are as  low as as say £100  a week or less, most of that will be spent on food,heating,water,so the 2.5% increase  isnt going to affect them a great deal, simply because they dont have the  disposable income to spend on the big ticket items that it will really affect.

A fair point. Squiggle was alluding to this the other day.

Are you at it again?  The other day I was supposed to have agreed a voting partnership with you.

We did! We did! It's gone.

Comes to summat when Sainsbury's head honcho is worrying about poor people and asking them not to whack it on food...though to be fair he did say he didn't think they were going to.