Eamonn Holmes vented his fury on GB News about a tax many “don’t know about” as he grilled Defence Secretary Grant Shapps.
The comment came about during a discussion about the Tories pledging a 2p tax cut in their election manifesto.
Shapps was setting out how exactly the Government would look to fund such a cut, to which Eamonn interjected: “By stealing from people.”
He added: “I am one of them. This IR35 is one of these retrospective taxes that people don’t really understand.
Eamonn vented his fury at Grant Shapps
GB NEWS
“It’s going to come for you if you’re a window cleaner, a teacher or whatever.
“You guys go back and say, ‘you know we said you’re freelance, well that’s changed’. It’s stealing. It’s theft.”
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Shapps responded by pointing out that the IR35 rules are not the topic of their discussion, but added that he is “sorry” Eamonn is affected by it.
The GB News star responded: “So many people are hit by it.”
IR35, or off-payroll working rules, ensures that a worker (sometimes known as a contractor) pays broadly the same Income Tax and National Insurance as an employee would.
Later in the show, Eamonn addressed his comments and outlined why exactly he was left so frustrated by Grant Shapps’s response.
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Grant Shapps was setting out the Tories' tax plans on GB News this morning
GB NEWS
“The tax was brought about by George Osborne then he sloped off as he stole money out of people’s pockets”, he said.
“It’s fine to say to people, ‘we’ve been agreeing your freelance but actually we’ve got that wrong, we’re going to change that’, I don’t think anyone has any issue with that.
“It’s different then going to somebody and saying, ‘we want eight years back tax and national insurance from you from when you were first classified’, when you didn’t think you were doing anything wrong.
“It will affect you, if you are a taxi driver, a Gardner, a painter or decorator. They put people like me in the papers because it will give them a headline and go, ‘he will be dodging his tax’, and then they will come and knock on your door and do the same.
“When I hear the Tories say they’re the party of small business, tell us, if you’re a small business, how they are helping you.”
The Tories promised to cut a further 2p off employees’ national insurance by April 2027 and abolish the main rate of the tax for the self-employed entirely by the end of the parliament.
“We are cutting taxes for workers, for parents and pensioners, and we are the party of Margaret Thatcher and Nigel Lawson, a party, unlike Labour, that believes in sound money,” Sunak said in his speech yesterday.