Have there been ‘25 Tory tax rises’?

1 May 2024

We’ve heard another repeat of Labour’s claim that there’ve been 25 tax rises since 2019. 

In a video posted on X (formerly Twitter), shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves referenced “25 Tory tax rises”.

Ms Reeves and other Labour politicians, including Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer and members of the shadow Treasury team, have made similar claims in recent months. 

As we’ve explained before, it’s not clear how Labour arrived at this figure and they’ve not published their workings. 

Full Fact was sent what appeared to be the list of 25 tax rises by shadow Treasury minister Lord Livermore back in January. It includes a range of tax rises that have been introduced since 2019, but omits others, such as the windfall tax. 

The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) told us there have likely been hundreds of tax rises (and reductions) since 2019, and simply counting the number of tax rises “isn’t very interesting or meaningful”. 

The IFS said a better way of measuring tax rises is to look at the total amount of tax raised, and by this metric, this Parliament is “the biggest tax-raising Parliament in modern times”. 

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