Later today Rachel Reeves will deliver her Spring Statement to the Commons. She has not, it must be said, helmed the happiest run of these set-piece occasions. Her first Budget involved roughly £40 billion in tax rises. Another was memorably marred by an early leak of market-sensitive material. 

Yet it is not only in the grand moments that this government has struggled. Growth has been anaemic, the tax burden is at a post-war high, and there remains a sizeable contingent on the Labour benches for whom spending restraint is an unknown, perhaps faintly distasteful, concept. Even Tony Blair agrees as much.

Still, amid the familiar gloom, one piece of wage news this week may – just possibly – carry the seeds of long-term reform, albeit not for the reason its authors intended.

MPs’ salaries are now set to rise to around £110,000 by the end of this Parliament, ostensibly in recognition of growing demands on their time and swelling casework (though cynics might observe that much of this burden is borne by their long-suffering staff). The immediate uplift amounts to roughly 5 per cent – an inflation-busting figure beside the 3.3 per cent reportedly pencilled in for nurses and the 3.5 per cent for parliamentary staff.

There’s an argument to pay MPs more, to attract better talent and pull people away from their already high-paid jobs. But this particular increase has an intriguing side effect: it nudges many MPs squarely into one of Britain’s most perverse fiscal contraptions.

By placing it above £100,000 it might just push MPs into fixing the horrendous, work-discincentivising tax trap, whereby earners on between £100,000 and £125,140 face an effective 60 per cent marginal tax rate. 

For every £2 earned over £100,000, £1 of the personal allowance is lost, creating the hidden tax band on top of the 40 per cent higher rate.

Plus earners in this bracket see the end of free child support. Workers end up worse off as they earn more.

With an MP’s salary north of £100,000, many parliamentarians will now find themselves staring directly into this fiscal abyss for the first time. It would be the latest in Westminster waking up to issues that they personally feel.

Take student loans. While Kemi Badenoch has recently led the way on the issue in opposition – pledging to cut interest rates on student loans – there are young Labour MPs who have been feeling the pain of repayments personally, and it might lead to yet another U-turn from Sir Keir Starmer and his Chancellor.

Labour MP for Uxbridge and South Ruislip Danny Beales last night tweeted:

“It’s time to talk about student loans and the need to deliver change. 

“The Plan 2 system has effectively become a graduate tax – with many feeling the system is unfair and regressive.

“Last week, I outlined the need for change in my letter to the Chancellor.”

Beales’ letter says he “does not regret taking out the loan” but many other new, young MPs have spoken about their £90,000 debt under the Plan 2 system, and I can’t now imagine wanting to accidentally fall into a higher marginal tax rate. With this pay rise, MPs who still have student debt will end up paying a marginal tax rate of 71 per cent over £100,000 and 77 per cent for postgrads.

Maybe this is the state we have got to, we need our parliamentarians to have directly felt an issue to want to fix it. It concentrates the mind.

But perhaps the best solution is one floated by the Taxpayers’ Alliance (TPA), acknowledged by shadow business secretary Andrew Griffith, and even hinted at by Business Secretary Peter Kyle: link MPs’ pay to GDP per capita, which measures the average economic output per person.

Kyle said to link their pay to overall GDP to encourage departments to do more to boost economic growth, but doing so with GDP per capita is a better prompt for this – tying it to the prosperity of individual Brits.

And Griffith had suggested doing so with senior civil servants to “bring a sharper focus next time Whitehall is introducing more red tape on business”.

If it were to apply to MPs it would, according to research from the TPA, lead to an actual pay cut. If MPs’ pay had gone up by GDP per capita since 2010, their pay would be £81,945.

As their campaigns director and our ConHome columnist Elliot Keck writes: “That’s brutal, but it’s just a reflection of the decades of terrible policy choices made by Parliament.”

Maybe then we would see more than just a reconsideration of the tax trap, maybe we would see pro-growth policies finally enacted.

Nothing clarifies the case for economic reform quite like paying the bill yourself.

Lord Ashcroft KCMG PC is an international businessman, philanthropist, author and pollster. For more information on his work, visit lordashcroft.com

My latest polling looks at preferred coalitions and tactical voting, which parties have momentum, whether Reform UK are like the Conservatives (and in a good or bad way), whether Keir Starmer should resign, and which Labour leadership contender would make the best prime minister. Ahead of International Women’s Day, we also look at favourability towards current and recent female politicians.

Preferred coalitions

Overall, voters were more likely to say they would prefer a Labour-Lib Dem-Green coalition (43 per cent) than a Conservative-Reform coalition (33 per cent), with just under a quarter saying they didn’t know.

Those currently intending to vote Labour, Green and Lib Dem overwhelmingly preferred a coalition of their parties.  On the other side, nearly nine in ten of those leaning towards Reform said they would prefer a coalition of their party and the Conservatives. However, only just over seven in ten of those intending to vote Conservative said they would prefer a coalition with Reform; more than one fifth of current Tories said they didn’t know which coalition they would prefer.

 The Labour government

Only 7 per cent of voters overall (including only around one in six 2024 Labour voters) said they thought the current Labour government believed in the right things and was getting them done. A further one in five (including 40 per cent of 2024 Labour voters) thought the government believed in the rights things but were not getting them done. Nearly half of all voters, including nearly three in ten 2024 Labour voters, said the government did not seem to know what it believed in.

Among those spoken of as potential future Labour leadership contenders, Andy Burnham was comfortably ahead both among voters as a whole and among current and 2024 Labour voters. While there was little to choose between Rayner, Streeting and Miliband in the country as a whole, Labour supporters put Rayner in second place, with Streeting a distant fourth.

When we asked people to name without prompting what they remembered that the Labour government had done since being elected, the two most common answers were lifting the two-child benefit cap and means testing the winter fuel allowance. U-turns and raising employers’ National Insurance were next on the list.

Our political map shows what kind of voters have noticed which government actions. Means testing the winter fuel allowance and lifting the two-child benefit cap both appear close to the centre of the map, showing they were recalled across the electorate rather than by any particular group. The Chagos Islands deal, U-turns and tax rises were most likely to be mentioned by those on Conservative and Reform-supporting side of the map, while the minimum wage, NHS waiting lists, rail renationalisation, workers’ rights and school breakfast clubs were more likely to be recalled in Labour, Lib Dem and Green territory.

Nearly a quarter of voters said Keir Starmer should resign if Labour lose the Gorton & Denton by-election, while just over one third said he should not. However, a further 21 per cent said he should resign whatever the result of the by-election.

Slightly more said Starmer should resign if Labour badly in the council elections in May, with 28 per cent saying he should not. Again, just over one in five said he should resign whatever the local election results.

The pension triple lock

More than six in ten voters, including majorities of all parties’ supporters, said the pension triple lock should be kept. Nearly 90 per cent of those aged sixty-five or over said it should be kept, compared to four in ten of those aged 18-24.

Are Reform UK like the Conservatives?

Just under half of all voters, including around three quarters of current Labour, Lib Dem and Green voters, said they thought of Reform UK as being a bit like the Conservatives, in a bad way. Just over half of those currently intending to vote Reform said they thought of the party as being a bit like the Conservatives in a good way, while just over one third of them thought Reform were not like the Conservatives.

Party momentum

Reform UK were the party most likely to be considered “on the way up”, followed by the Greens. Nearly seven in ten said they thought Labour were on their way down, including a majority of those who voted Labour in 2024.

Female politicians

In advance of International Women’s Day, we asked how favourable people felt towards various current and recent living female politicians. Ranked in order of the proportion saying they had a favourable view, Kemi Badnoch topped the list, followed by Theresa May, Angela Rayner and Jess Phillips. Next were Nicola Sturgeon, Harriet Harman, Caroline Lucas and Yvette Cooper. Below, our political map shows how favourability towards these individuals is distributed across the population:

Trust on the economy

Asked who would do the better job running the economy, voters chose Kemi Badenoch and Mel Stride over Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves by a 4-point margin, with 40 per cent saying, “don’t know”. Only just over half of 2024 Labour voters named the Labour team; more than seven in ten 2024 Conservatives chose the Tory team.

Best (and most likely) prime minister

In a head-to-head question, Badenoch led Starmer by one point with just over one third saying “don’t know”. Just over six in ten 2024 Labour voters say Starmer would make the better PM, while nearly three quarters of 2024 Conservatives named Badenoch. Those who voted Reform UK in 2024 said they preferred Badenoch to Starmer by a 61-point margin, with one in three saying “don’t know”.

Given a choice between Starmer and Farage, voters as a whole chose Starmer by 13 points. 2024 Conservatives chose Farage over Starmer by 53 per cent to 15 per cent, while 2024 Labour voters chose Starmer by 75 per cent to 8 per cent. Lib Dems chose Starmer by a 58-point margin, and Green voters did so by 57 points.

Offered a choice between Starmer, Badenoch and Farage, voters chose Starmer over Farage by a 12-point margin, with Badenoch in third place on 18 per cent. 2024 Conservative voters preferred Badenoch over Farage by a 19-point margin (up from 6 points in November), and 2024 Labour voters preferred Starmer over Badenoch by 58 points.

Nigel Farage was thought the most likely person to be PM after the next election, with 29 per cent naming him as the most likely candidate. Only one in ten thought Starmer would still be in the job and 7 per cent named Badenoch. More than one fifth thought someone other than these three would be PM. More than eight in ten of those currently intending to vote Reform thought Farage would be PM, compared to fewer than four in ten current Labour leaners who thought Starmer would be PM and just over a quarter of current Conservative supporters who thought Badenoch would have the job.

When we asked how likely people were to end up voting for each party at the next election on a scale from zero to 100, those who voted Labour in 2024 put their chances of doing so again at the next election at an average of 43/100. Those who switched to Labour in 2024 put their chances of voting for the party again next time at 34/100, and those who switched from the Conservatives to Labour in 2024 put their chances of voting Labour again next time at an average of 27/100.  Looking at those more likely than not to vote for a particular party (those whose highest likelihood of voting for one party was at least 50/100), this implies current vote shares of Reform UK 22 per cent, Conservative 20 per cent, Green 19 per cent, Labour 17% per cent, Lib Dems 11 per cent, Others 10 per cent.

As above, our political map shows how different issues, attributes, personalities and opinions interact with one another. Each point shows where we are most likely to find people with that characteristic or opinion; the closer the plot points are to each other the more closely related they are. Here we see the distribution of opinion on the Labour government, the pensions triple lock, most likely prime minister and whether or not Reform are like the Conservatives.

Full data tables available at LordAshcroftPolls.com

David Willetts is President of the Resolution Foundation and is a member of the House of Lords.

One of the strong themes on Conservative Home is the importance of the Conservative Party reaching out to younger voters.

So it is great to see the Conservative Party launching its New Deal for Young People which is a bold attempt to plug this gap. Any evidence of the party thinking beyond its core vote of pensioners is to be welcomed.

There are three particular proposals.

First Kemi caught the mood with her proposal to get rid of interest rates on graduate debt. That is certainly a hot topic at the moment. The terms of graduate repayment for the cost of their education should be open to change with proper political debate about the trade-offs. The interest rates have always been the most unpopular feature of the model so it is understandable to try to do something about them. Hitting RPI + 3 per cent when earnings go above £51,000 is a painful blow, especially after the replacement of maintenance grants with loans and then periods of high inflation mean that total graduate debt can now be much bigger than originally envisaged.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies has just done a useful analysis of this and other options and estimate that:

“For those who started courses in 2022/23, this proposal would on average reduce lifetime loan repayments by £11,000 in today’s prices on average. The 30% of graduates with the highest lifetime earnings could expect to save upwards of £20,000. Many low-earning graduates would never repay any less as a result of the Conservative proposal – with almost no change in lifetime repayments amongst the fifth of graduates with the lowest lifetime earnings.”

That is a significant boost for higher earning graduates. Once all graduates in Stage 2 are included the IFS estimate a “low-single-digit billions hit to government receipts each year, for the next 30 years.”

However this change does not affect monthly repayments – the gain comes in paying back sooner.

It you really want to help boost living standards of younger graduates you raise the repayment threshold, so their fixed monthly out-goings are cut. And it was of course the freeze of the repayment threshold which was the original trigger for the current political row.

There are tricky trade-offs here between size of debt, monthly repayment, and length of repayment period.  I continue to believe that every five years we should have a proper informed open assessment of the best way to make these trade-offs. Governments should then set the repayment terms in ways which make intuitive sense such as graduates only start paying back when their incomes are close to the average pay of non-graduates.

The Tory leadership have in their sights degrees leading to low salaries – and after long battles it is great that data is available. If those courses close then prospective students may choose a different university course instead rather than head to an apprenticeship instead. It would be wrong to stop them going to courses which appear to offer better value and I understand it is not Conservative policy to erect such barriers. Such a shift to a different course could however reduce loan write-offs which yields a type of expenditure saving.

Apprenticeships are always popular. But numbers of apprenticeship starts are falling.  The second proposal in the New Deal is to boost apprenticeships for 18–21-year-olds. This is well targeted. During the last years of Conservative Government apprenticeships moved a long way from their original purpose. They became predominantly higher-level qualifications for people aged over 25 (who are now half of all apprentices starts). It is right to refocus them on 18–21-year-olds.

There is a levy on employers to pay from apprenticeships though the intention is that these extra places should be financed differently. Nevertheless reform of the Apprenticeship levy should be on the agenda. Each employer gets first claim on the levy they have paid and understandably tend to use it on extra training for their current employees rather than new recruits. That is why the growth in apprenticeships has been in degree level apprenticeships for older employees whereas places for younger people at lower educational levels have been falling. There needs to be a strong financial incentive to get them to shift to younger people, new recruits, and perhaps a qualification at a lower education level such as A level equivalent rather than full honours degree. This could be delivered out of existing resources if degree apprenticeships were financed out of fees and loans like other higher-level qualifications.

The third proposal is a “£5,000 First Job Bonus, allowing young people to keep the first £5,000 of National Insurance they would have paid and placing it into a savings account for a first home or future security”

When we at Resolution Foundation looked at how best to help younger people we proposed a capital grant of £10,000. These types of schemes are in the tradition of council house sales and privatisation share sales as opportunities to spread ownership. But they are if anything more widely accessible.  It is a great way of helping young people build up assets. It has a cost of perhaps about £3b a year. We are entering an inheritocracy where building up assets out of income has got harder.

The real opportunity agenda is to spread property ownership and this proposal is an important part of that.