11 Oct Tough decisions needed to grow the economy and improve schools and the NHS, says Labour
LABOUR’S Shadow Paymaster General has warned that “tough decisions” are needed to grow the economy and fund improvements to the NHS and schools.
Jonathan Ashworth MP told GB News: “We need to get economic growth in our economy but all the spending commitments we’ve made, specific spending commitments like our plan to deliver two million extra appointments in our National Health service, our plan to recruit more specialist teachers for our schools, we’ve outlined how we’re going to do that, we are going to take some tough decisions.
“We’re going to deal with something called the non-dom tax status. We are going to look at VAT on school fees.
“These are tough decisions and not everybody supports them. But when money is tight, we have to take tough decisions.”
In a discussion with Patrick Christys, he dismissed a suggestion that it was optimistic to expect to raise £3.2 billion from abolishing the non-dom tax status.
“There were plenty of the think tanks, outside experts who think that money can be raised and we want to raise that money, because there’s also a principle that if you live and work here, you should pay your taxes here.
“I’m not denying that there are people who oppose this and I know it’s a tough decision, but we’ve got to take tough decisions for the future of this country.”
On the party’s house building plans, Mr Ashworth added: “We need to be building houses for people and I want people who are watching GB News today who have been denied the dream of homeownership, I want to help them get on the housing ladder.
“We’re going to build more homes for people. Home ownership is really, really important. If you own a home, it transforms your horizons.”
