Labour’s rhetoric on inheritance tax ‘made me feel guilty’

Labour’s rhetoric on inheritance tax ‘made me feel guilty’

Frank Skinner has said he has been put off Labor by its threats to raise inheritance tax.

The comedian, 67, said he has always voted for Labor but is “made to feel a bit guilty” by the party’s rhetoric on the controversial tax.

“When I hear Labor talking about people who earn this (much) … I think, but I had nothing, I worked really hard,” he told the BBC’s The Today Podcast.

“I thought you’d like me. “I thought I’d be a poster boy… (showing) working class people can actually get on and compete and can do well, but now you’re lumping me with all those people who inherited a load of money.”

Skinner added: “I just think when it’s things like inheritance tax and stuff like that, you should be in a special section if you crawled up from nothing. “I shouldn’t be in the same section as the Rees-Mogg children.”

His comments came amid concern that Rachel Reeves, the Chancellor, is paving the way towards raising inheritance tax after unveiling a £22 billion fiscal black hole in the government finances.

The Chancellor accused the Tories of “covering up” the true state of the public finances and warned that following a series of cuts there would be more “difficult decisions” in the months ahead.

Rachel Reeve is working to plug a £22 billion black hole she claims the Conservatives covered up – LUCY NORTH/POOL/AFP via Getty Images

With Labor having ruled out raising National Insurance, the basic, higher or additional rates of income tax, or VAT as part of its manifesto, inheritance tax, pensions reliefs and capital gains, appear likely targets as Ms Reeves seeks to raise more than £10 billion.

Skinner grew up on a council estate in Oldbury and has previously said he votes Labour, “but only because of some vague sense of working-class duty”.

Speaking to the BBC podcast, Skinner also said he feels “educated” by cancel culture.

The comedian has been accused of racist behavior in the 1990s when, along with David Baddiel on the Fantasy Football League show, he mocked Jason Lee, a black footballer.

“All this recent woke politics of the last 10 years has had an effect on me – I’ve become a parent during that period,” he said. “When I was growing up in the West Midlands, I got to be brutal, racist, language, sexist, language, homophobic, it was absolutely the norm.”

He added: “It wasn’t that I wasn’t listening to the alternate voice, there was no alternate voice. I didn’t even question it.

“But I do question it now and I have questioned it a lot.

“I think most of us have in recent years, I don’t feel forced or bullied by woke politics – I feel educated by it.”