Jeremy Corbyn backs Jon Trickett's wealth tax plan designed to raise over £200bn from richest

Mr Trickett’s proposals for a radical overhaul of the tax system in a new 75-page report have been backed by former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, along with other left-wing MPs such as John McDonnell, Rebecca Long-Bailey, Ian Lavery and Diane Abbott.

Mr Trickett, who represents Hemsworth, has put forward four potential options for a new wealth tax - a one-off charge at a rate of five per cent over £500,000 per individual; a one-off charge on wealth over £2m at rates starting at eight per cent and going to 15 per cent on wealth over £10m; an annual tax of wealth above £2m, starting at a one per cent and a ‘hybrid tax’ that would include a one-off tax plus an annual tax on wealth increases at 20 per cent - the same base rate as income tax.

The report said the median revenue of the four options is £218.4 billion, with the hybrid option potentially raising a further £85.7 billion.

It also finds that bringing taxes on dividends and capital gains into line with income tax would raise a further £127 billion in revenue over a five year period, whilst closing tax avoidance loopholes and tackling tax evasion would raise a total of £145.5 billion.

Mr Trickett said: “Our political system is rigged in favour of global corporations and the super-rich. We must take urgent action to reduce extreme wealth inequality. Keir Starmer said that Labour will look into a wealth tax. My report shows how it could be achieved.

“A wealth tax would transform our public finances making money available for our neglected public services. We could afford to plug the social care funding gap and to give our key workers a pay rise. We could reverse local government and education cuts. And we could rebuild Britain into a dynamic Green economy which focuses on investment and growth rather than just old ideas of tax and spend.

“Bringing taxes on wealth into line with those on income is both morally as well as fiscally correct. But it is also a bold policy which will appeal to both voters and the labour movement precisely because it has one of our core values, fairness, at its centre.”

Jeremy Corbyn said: “The government keeps cutting spending on public services and attacking the incomes of the poorest, yet the wealthiest are allowed to keep piling up money. It’s time we tackled the gross accumulation of wealth and growing inequality, both in terms of class and region - redistributing wealth from the very richest to working people. I welcome Jon’s report and the national discussion it launches.”

In September, Sir Keir Starmer said a tax on wealth aimed at “those with the broadest shoulders” should be used to pay for an improved social care system.

Responding to Government plans to increase National Insurance to fund social care reform, he told the Commons: “The alternative is obvious: a timetable, a plan to clear waiting lists just as we did under the last Labour government, a comprehensive report planned for social care dealing with the inadequacies I have just pointed out, and driving up the equality of provision, and not just tinkering with the funding model.

“We do need to ask those with the broadest shoulders to pay more and that does include asking much more of wealthier people including income from stocks, from shares, from dividends and from property.”

Later in the same month, he told the BBC that Labour tax policy for the next election would be determined by the state of the nation's finances.

He told The Andrew Marr Show on BBC One: “We are looking at tax – nothing is off the table, but we don’t know what the state of the national finances will be as we go to the election.

“What Rachel Reeves (shadow chancellor) said is she’s not currently considering income tax and that is fine, but what I’m saying is as we go into the election we will apply the principles we have set out to the situation as it arises.

“What we don’t want to do – whether it’s income tax or any other sort of tax, national insurance – is unfairly to hit working families, which is what this Government is doing.”

He did not say whether he is looking at a wealth tax, but added: “Look at the choice the Government is making – under their provision, under their tax they announced the other week, those with many properties as landlords don’t pay a penny more, their working tenants do.”

Read more:

Keir Starmer's essay on Labour's future 'wont be read in the miners' club', says Jon Trickett

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