Simon Clement-Jones, LD

Lib Dem PPC (Sheffield Heeley),

Simon Clement-Jones' reply

"The answer to your three questions are simply yes, yes and yes. I think it is appalling that under this Labour government, the gap between the richest and the poorest in our society has grown so much. While income inequality has remained about the same, wealth inequality – shares and property - has increased. The effect of this on the poorest members of our society is compounded by having one of the most unfair tax systems in the developed world. The wealthiest benefit from special loopholes and the rest of us end up paying more. Labour has failed to make our tax system fair, while the Conservatives’ top priority is tax cuts for millionaires.

Liberal Democrats want to make our tax and benefits system fairer, so that everyone whether young or old can afford to get by. We have plans for the most radical, far-reaching tax reforms in a generation. We will cut taxes for millions of working people and pensioners, paid for by making sure polluters and the very wealthy pay their fair share. We would stop people paying any income tax on the first £10,000 they earn. This would stop 3.4 million low earners paying any income tax at all and would put £700 back into the pocket of low and middle income earners. Our proposed ‘mansion tax’ directly shifts wealth from wealthier to helps us to shift taxation away from people on low and middle incomes – on its own, it could shift hundreds of thousands low-paid workers out of income tax altogether.

We will also boost the state pension by restoring the link with earnings growth, to ensure pensioner income can keep pace and we will crack down on unfair bills. To ensure that the living standards of pensioners improve at the same pace as the rest of the population we will increase the state pension by average earnings, prices or 2.5% whichever is higher. The Government is only committed to increasing the pension in line with earnings from 2012, not the higher of earnings or prices. The Government’s own projections show it expects earnings to increase at a slower rate than prices in 2011-12 which will mean the pension will be cut in real terms and pensioners will feel the pinch".