Voters expect Burnham to hike taxes
Taxes will rise to even higher levels under Andy Burnham’s government as the likely-incoming Prime Minister ramps up spending on council housing and public services, voters have predicted.
Morning Wire/Freshwater polling has shown that more than half of voters expect taxes to increase under Burnham’s government regardless of which Labour figure takes over from Rachel Reeves as Chancellor.
Polling showed that 55 per cent believed taxes would increase while just nine per cent thought they would fall.
Reeves has already raised some £65bn in taxes over her two years as Chancellor while pumping more cash into areas such as health and education, largely through offering doctors and other public sector workers bigger pay packages.
The largest tax rise came through a £25bn hike to employers’ national insurance contributions (NICs). Economists have said that the tax contributed to the unemployment rate rising from 4.4 per cent to over five per cent.
Most Labour voters, alongside those backing Reform, Tory and the Liberal Democrats, also agreed that taxes were likely to go up further in a Burnham government.
Burnham and other senior Labour figures such as Wes Streeting have backed levelling capital gains taxes with income taxes, while other measures such as property levy reforms and wealth taxes have been rumoured to be under consideration.
Tax pledges backed by Burnham
The former Manchester mayor has so far committed to stick to Labour’s 2024 manifesto, which included large commitments to not raise income tax, VAT or national insurance. Reeves has largely relied on raising smaller taxes to fund higher wages for public sector workers and capital investment.
Voters also largely back a levy on wealth despite shaky details on how the tax will be implemented and how effective it will be. When asked if they would support increasing charges on wealth including assets or property to fund public services, around 51 per cent of voters said they would.
Economists at the Institute for Fiscal Studies and experts including Dan Neidle have widely warned that a direct levy on asset holdings would deliver little to no gains in tax receipts and damage growth prospects. Chancellor Rachel Reeves declined to impose a tax despite pressure from backbench MPs.
While some Labour figures including Streeting have called for capital gains taxes to be levelled with income taxes, Burnham has been warned to avoid using reform as a “cash cow” for attempting to gain greater receipts by his adviser and former Bank of England economist Andy Haldane.
The majority of voters also said they would like Burnham to stick to the fiscal rules and deliver on launching the biggest council housebuilding programme in post-war Britain.
Voters were less supportive of cutting the welfare budget to fund defence spending, which is an idea trumpeted by Tory leader Kemi Badenoch, and creating a ‘Number 10 in the North’ as part of a devolution drive, which has been promised by Burnham. However, there is broad support for “transferring significant powers and funding from Westminster to regional and local government”.
A spokesperson for Burnham has said they will not comment on tax speculation or write policy “off the cuff”.
Method note: Freshwater Strategy interviewed n=1,240 eligible voters in the UK, aged 18+ online, between 3 – 5 July 2026. Margin of Error +/- 2.8%. Data are weighted to be representative of UK voters. Freshwater Strategy are members of the British Polling Council and abide by their rules.