London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Friday, Oct 10, 2025

Tory conference: Liz Truss will lose 45p tax rate vote, says Shapps

Tory conference: Liz Truss will lose 45p tax rate vote, says Shapps

Liz Truss would lose a Commons vote on cutting the top rate of income tax, former cabinet minister Grant Shapps has told.

Scrapping the 45% top rate was a key part of last Friday's mini-budget aimed at boosting growth.

But it has faced a growing backlash from Conservative MPs after market turmoil and a big slide in the polls.

Michael Gove earlier hinted that he would vote against it - but Mr Shapps has now gone further.

The former transport secretary warned Ms Truss not to have a "tin ear" to voters' concerns about rising living costs and to do a U-turn as soon as possible.

"Let's not muddy the water with... tax cuts for wealthy people right now, when the priority needs to be on everyday households," he said.

MPs are not likely to get a chance to vote on the tax changes until next spring, but Mr Shapps suggested enough Tory MPs would join forces with Labour and other opposition parties to defeat it.

"I don't think the House is in a place where it's likely to support that," he told the BBC on the first day of the Conservative conference in Birmingham.

Like others who supported Rishi Sunak in the Tory leadership contest, Mr Shapps was fired from the cabinet by Ms Truss when she became prime minister.

But Mr Shapps insisted he was not being unhelpful to the new PM. "Sometimes budgets go wrong when they're announced," he said.

He cited former Chancellor George Osborne's 2012 Budget - dubbed the "omnishambles" - as an example of when economic policies have been "quickly reversed".

"And you know what? We went on to win the next election. So I mean this to be entirely helpful. There is a way through this. But the way through isn't to put fingers in the ear."

Instead of just "pushing on" with the 45p top rate cut, he said the government "needed to actually recognise that we're trying to do something here, which really isn't possible at this moment".

Later on Monday, Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng will use his Conservative conference speech to insist the government will "stay the course" on his tax-cutting growth plan, arguing that without tax reform the country is heading for "slow decline".

Earlier, Conservative Party chairman Jake Berry warned that Tory MPs who voted against the prime minister's tax measures would be kicked out of the parliamentary party - known as losing the whip.

Talking to Sky News, Mr Berry urged Conservatives to back the prime minister, adding: "I'm sure that if we do that it will lead ultimately to long-term electoral success."

But former Levelling-Up Secretary Michael Gove - who also backed Mr Sunak in the leadership contest - said there were "two major" problems with the prime minister's plans.

"The first is the sheer risk of using borrowed money to fund tax cuts - that's not Conservative," he said.

The second, he argued, was to cut the top rate of income tax and scrap the cap on bankers' bonuses "at a time when people are suffering".

Asked if Ms Truss would be prime minister this time next year, he said she would but added: "There needs to be a course correction."

And asked on the Telegraph's Chopper's Politics Live podcast if the prime minister had a mandate for her tax changes, Mr Gove argued she did for changes to National Insurance and corporation tax - because she had campaigned for them during the leadership contest.

But he added: "What was not discussed was the prospect of income tax cuts, particularly income tax cuts for the very wealthiest."


Watch Grant Shapps: "Let's not muddy the water with... tax cuts for wealthy people right now"


Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
California County Reinstates Mask Mandate in Health Facilities as Respiratory Illness Risk Rises
Israel and Hamas Agree to First Phase of Trump-Brokered Gaza Truce, Hostages to Be Freed
French Political Turmoil Elevates Marine Le Pen as Rassemblement National Poised for Power
China Unveils Sweeping Rare Earth Export Controls to Shield ‘National Security’
The Davos Set in Decline: Why the World Economic Forum’s Power Must Be Challenged
France: Less Than a Month After His Appointment, the New French Prime Minister Resigns
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán stated that Hungary will not adopt the euro because the European Union is falling apart.
Sarah Mullally Becomes First Woman Appointed Archbishop of Canterbury
Mayor in western Germany in intensive care after stabbing
Australian government pays Deloitte nearly half a million dollars for a report built on fabricated quotes, fake citations, and AI-generated nonsense.
US Prosecutors Gained Legal Approval to Hack Telegram Servers
Macron Faces Intensifying Pressure to Resign or Trigger New Elections Amid France’s Political Turmoil
Standard Chartered Names Roberto Hoornweg as Sole Head of Corporate & Investment Banking
UK Asylum Housing Firm Faces Backlash Over £187 Million Profits and Poor Living Conditions
UK Police Crack Major Gang in Smuggling of up to 40,000 Stolen Phones to China
BYD’s UK Sales Soar Nearly Nine-Fold, Making Britain Its Biggest Market Outside China
Trump Proposes Farm Bailout from Tariff Revenues Amid Backlash from Other Industries
FIFA Accuses Malaysia of Forging Citizenship Documents, Suspends Seven Footballers
Latvia to Bar Tourist and Occasional Buses to Russia and Belarus Until 2026
A Dollar Coin Featuring Trump’s Portrait Expected to Be Issued Next Year
Australia Orders X to Block Murder Videos, Citing Online Safety and Public Exposure
Three Scientists Awarded Nobel Prize in Medicine for Discovery of Immune Self-Tolerance Mechanism
OpenAI and AMD Forge Landmark AI-Chip Alliance with Equity Option
Munich Airport Reopens After Second Drone Shutdown
France Names New Government Amid Political Crisis
Trump Stands Firm in Shutdown Showdown and Declares War on Drug Cartels — Turning Crisis into Opportunity
Surge of U.S. Billionaires Transforms London’s Peninsula Apartments into Ultra-Luxury Stronghold
Pro Europe and Anti-War Babiš Poised to Return to Power After Czech Parliamentary Vote
Jeff Bezos Calls AI Surge a ‘Good’ Bubble, Urges Focus on Lasting Innovation
Japan’s Ruling Party Chooses Sanae Takaichi, Clearing Path to First Female Prime Minister
Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs Sentenced to Fifty Months in Prison Following Prostitution Conviction
Taylor Swift’s ‘Showgirl’ Launch Extends Billion-Dollar Empire
Trump Administration Launches “TrumpRx” Plan to Enable Direct Drug Sales at Deep Discounts
Trump Announces Intention to Impose 100 Percent Tariff on Foreign-Made Films
Altman Says GPT-5 Already Outpaces Him, Warns AI Could Automate 40% of Work
Singapore and Hong Kong Vie to Dominate Asia’s Rising Gold Trade
Trump Organization Teams with Saudi Developer on $1 Billion Trump Plaza in Jeddah
Manhattan Sees Surge in Office-to-Housing Conversions, Highest Since 2008
Switzerland and U.S. Issue Joint Assurance Against Currency Manipulation
Electronic Arts to Be Taken Private in Historic $55 Billion Buyout
Thomas Jacob Sanford Named as Suspect in Deadly Michigan Church Shooting and Arson
Russian Research Vessel 'Yantar' Tracked Mapping Europe’s Subsea Cables, Raising Security Alarms
New York Man Arrested After On-Air Confession to 2017 Parents’ Murders
U.S. Defense Chief Orders Sudden Summit of Hundreds of Generals and Admirals
Global Cruise Industry Posts Dramatic Comeback with 34.6 Million Passengers in 2024
Trump Claims FBI Planted 274 Agents at Capitol Riot, Citing Unverified Reports
India: Internet Suspended in Bareilly Amid Communal Clashes Between Muslims and Hindus
Supreme Court Extends Freeze on Nearly $5 Billion in U.S. Foreign Aid at Trump’s Request
Archaeologists Recover Statues and Temples from 2,000-Year-Old Sunken City off Alexandria
China Deploys 2,000 Workers to Spain to Build Major EV Battery Factory, Raising European Dependence
×