Tomorrow's 2.5% VAT increase, which will raise £13bn towards paying off Labour's legacy of deficit debt, seems to have political opponents across the Nation in a mathematical meltdown.
According to the SNP, the VAT rise could cost Scottish households around £590 a year. http://www.snp.org/node/17581
Of course, issues over potential tax raising has proved to be a bit of a sore point for the Nationalists of late....
On the other hand, Labour leader Ed Miliband said the average family would have to find an extra £7.50 "each and every week", adding up to an extra £389 a year http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-12106168
The V.A.T. rise will no doubt be universally unwelcome but sadly necessary, the fire stoked by the media keen to whip the Nation into a frenzy of predictable anti-Government rage.
However, if you go back to the headlines when V.A.T. was reduced from 17.5% to 15% back in 2008 by Labour, the puny amount was hardly noticed by the average shopper, the big stores said it barely increased sales & made little to no difference. No credit was given at all for the modest reduction, only ridicule & criticism.
Lets not forget, former Chancellor Alistair Darling actually wanting to raise VAT to 20% too whilst in office to help reduce his own Government's deficit.
Finally, tomorrow sees 100 days of Blank Paper from Miliband and no alternatives as to how Labour would find the £13bn of cuts required to help reduce Labour's deficit if no VAT increase was implemented. He truly is the Man without a Plan.
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