THIS GOVT IS ROBBING THE POOR TO PAY THE RICH

THE quip that the Tory ethos is to rob the poor to pay the rich will perhaps never be more fitting than this April. For that is exactly what they will be doing.

The Government has rightly been attacked by its opponents for the mad decision to give a huge tax break to the country's highest earners. It is a policy which grates at a time when the Prime Minister is telling the nation we all must share the burden of painful cuts.

But the shameful manner in which David Cameron and his cronies are balancing the books by attacking the poorest in society is really beyond the pale. Every council in the country has been forced to introduce a Council Tax Support scheme which cut the budget available to help those in most need by at least 10 per cent. Those typically losing out include people on low incomes, carers, those with disabilities and single mums.

And let us make no secret about who is making the saving. Not the councils who have been cornered into sorting out the Government's mess by coming up with a least-worst scheme. It is the Government that makes the saving because it is a Government budget being cut. The Government has, quite literally, taken the budget it spent last year, slashed it by 10 per cent then handed it to councils and said: "You decide who misses out, but somebody must". They have passed the buck but refused to hand over the bucks.

Compare that if you will to the high earners who will be pocketing a few extra thousand pounds just as the needy are coming to terms with the withdrawal of their support. A banker earning £250,000 per year will be £10,000 per year better off from April because of this Government. That's another £833.33 per month in their pay-packet.

I wonder how many families in poverty have had to sacrifice their Council Tax Support to fund that?

It simply doesn't sit comfortably on the conscience. How David Cameron and his Tories can sleep at night when they are destroying lives to help high earners enjoy more holidays is beyond me. I can't help but wonder if it was the subject of discussion at any of Mr Cameron's dinner parties for the millionaires whose funding helps the Conservatives orchestrate their election campaigns.

And let's not forget the Lib Dems either. They have been complicit in these changes, voting them through without a moment's hesitation.

But there is yet another twist to this pitiful tale, which casts an even darker shadow of the Government's dealings. Let's not forget it was this Government that put pressure on councils to not increases council tax with the promise of a one-off financial buffer for doing so. A one-off financial buffer that would not be an ounce of help every year beyond 2013/14, when those councils count the cost of not imposing an increase.

And this at a time when councils funding is being slashed so mercilessly by that same Government that raising the council tax income stream is the only means left to them to avoid bankruptcy. Yet while pretending to want to keep council tax low on the one hand, the council tax support schemes the Government has forced will do exactly the opposite.

In the constituency of Eric Pickles, the minister responsible for this social wrong, the lowest earners will pay £300 more council tax even without the council imposing an increase.

The whole thing is an almighty mess. It proves once again how out of touch the Government is. And it proves the claim that in Tory Britain the poor are robbed to pay the rich has never been more accurate.