Plaid Cymru accuses First Minister of ‘wealth tax hypocrisy’

Plaid Cymru has accused First Minister Eluned Morgan of hypocrisy after she publicly backed higher taxes for the wealthy to tackle child poverty – just days after her government voted against a Plaid motion proposing the same.

In a the foreword to a new Labour Party report, written by Cabinet Secretary for Social Justice Jane Hutt, Baroness Morgan argues that “those who can afford it” should pay more tax to fund measures that prevent children from going hungry.

She wrote: “It is time to make bold choices – taxing those who can afford it and putting that money where it belongs: into the lives of children.”

At odds

But Plaid’s social justice spokesperson Sioned Williams MS said the comments were at odds with Welsh Labour’s record in the Senedd.

Last week, Labour MSs voted down a Plaid motion calling for a 2% wealth tax on assets over £10m, the equalisation of capital gains tax with income tax, and the scrapping of the two-child benefit cap.

“If the First Minister feels so strongly about introducing a wealth tax you would have expected her to vote in favour of Plaid Cymru’s motion in the Senedd last week proposing just that,” Ms Williams said.

“Once again, we see Labour saying one thing and doing another. No wonder their popularity is plummeting when they take the public for fools.”

Weekly child payment

She argued that Labour has failed to use “every tool at their disposal” to tackle child poverty in Wales pointing to the scrapping of statutory targets to eradicate poverty in 2016 and urged ministers to follow Scotland’s example by introducing a direct weekly child payment.

Plaid has pledged to bring in such a policy if it wins power in 2026, insisting it would represent a “transformational” step to lift families out of hardship.

Ahead of the Labour conference, backbench MPs and unions renewed calls to end the two-child benefit cap.

Several MPs from Liverpool, the host city of the conference, were among those who wrote to the Prime Minister ahead of the gathering insisting the cap “is one of the most significant drivers of child poverty in Britain today”.

Challenged

Debate over the future of the cap is among a number of areas of benefits policy where ministers could be challenged by Labour members in Liverpool.

Among those who have previously called for it to go is Lucy Powell, the former Commons leader who is the frontrunner in the race to become the next Labour deputy leader.

Labour MPs forced a U-turn on Sir Keir’s plans to cut the benefits bill earlier this year.

But in a hint that ministers are willing to return to the battle, Darren Jones, the PM’s chief secretary and a senior Cabinet Office minister, told the Telegraph that the benefits bill is “unsustainable in the long run”.