Council tax clash
Council Tax was the principal theme of Wednesday, with the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats choosing to focus on this issue.
Reversing their previous position, the Conservatives announced that they would postpone any revaluation and rebanding of properties for Council Tax purposes during the forthcoming Parliament, as the centrepiece of their local government manifesto.
Conservative leader Michael Howard accused the Government of seeking to fill the “black hole” in its finances by a rebanding exercise that would lead to large Council Tax rises for many people – pointing to the rebanding carried out in Wales as an example.
“We will stop Mr Blair’s next stealth tax dead in its tracks by cancelling revaluation”, Mr Howard declared.
Local government spokesperson Caroline Spelman also pledged to abolish regional assemblies, praising the failure of the North East regional assembly referendum last year as a “notable triumph”.
At their morning press conference, the Liberal Democrats highlighted their plans to replace Council Tax with a local income tax. Party leader Charles Kennedy claimed that 50 per cent of Britons would be better off under a local income tax and a further 25 per cent would pay around the same amount (full story).
Mr Kennedy hit out at the planned revaluation as highlighting the “fundamental unfairness” of Council Tax, but he also condemned the “naked opportunism” of the Conservatives in changing their position.
Labour aimed to focus on family prosperity today. With Tony Blair on the road meeting “ordinary people”, Labour’s morning press conference was fronted by campaign co-ordinator Alan Milburn, who emphasised the party’s “school gate campaign”. He was accompanied by Chancellor Gordon Brown, who promised additional nursery provision, refurbishment of thousands of schools and hundreds of thousands of new apprenticeships. (full story).
Challenged on the question of Council Tax, however, Mr Milburn refused to be drawn, insisting that the rebanding would be “revenue neutral”. He claimed that the Conservatives’ new policy stems from the party’s poor “poll numbers”, and he warned of the Liberal Democrats’ attempts to portray their plans as “cost free”.
In the evening, Tony Blair was interviewed by Jeremy Paxman on BBC1. Questioned about Iraq – an issue that has been somewhat notable by its absence from the national campaign – Mr Blair replied, ” Now I know people strongly disagreed with it. I’m sorry. In the end I had to take the decision as prime minister that I thought was right for the country and I did so.” (full story).
He also admitted that the Government did not know how many illegal immigrants and failed asylum seekers there were at large in the country.
Wednesday also saw the launch of the first manifestos from the Northern Irish parties.
The SDLP (full story) and Ulster Unionist Party (full story) released their election programmes in the afternoon.
Finally, in the east London constituency of Bethnal Green and Bow, where Respect leader George Galloway is attempting to unseat Labour’s Oona King, a truce was called in the increasingly personal battle between them.
Following an attack on a Respect meeting by Islamic radicals, who made a death threat against Mr Galloway, he and Ms King joined other local candidates in move designed – as Ms King put it – to take the ” heat and vitriol out of this campaign”.
