Tories propose taking £3bn off the poor to fund £3bn tax cuts for the rich

According to BBC News the Tories propose taking £3bn off the poor to fund £3bn tax cuts for the rich.

The welfare freeze announced at #CPC2014 includes Jobseeker's Allowance, Income Support, Child Tax Credit and Working Tax Credit, Child Benefit and Employment Support Allowance (for those judged capable of work-related activity) and amounts to £3bn. (It’s part of £12bn in welfare reductions previously floated by the chancellor.)

For Labour, Chris Leslie, shadow chief secretary to the Treasury, said Mr Osborne “is choosing to give the richest one per cent a £3bn-a-year tax cut and opposing a mansion tax while cutting tax credits which make work pay for millions of striving families. While working people have seen their wages fall by £1,600 a year since 2010, the Tories have once again shown they are the party of a privileged few at the top."

Notice also that the chancellor said there would be £13bn of Whitehall savings, which will include public sector pay restraint. A tax rise in Tory speak is never called a tax rise. As Chomsky would say, it is called something like “public sector pay restraint” but it amounts to the same thing.