These four pages have been dashed off in order to be in time for the budget and constitute an offshoot of a much more substantial report:

Budget priorities: the parties and all of the people

Here we follow the same agenda without providing the supporting arguments – for which the original report should be referred to.

PART 1

The opinion survey

The questions

The net percentage as a mean

The ordering and grouping of the parties

Anticipation of fairness (Question B1)

Preferred level of taxation (Question B2) …

… All of the people

… the parties

The opinion survey

A survey was conducted by Opinium for The Observer over the period 19-21 November 2025.

https://www.opinium.com/resource-center/voting-intention-19th-november-2025/

The questions

Here we are interested in the questions about the anticipated fairness of the budget and about the preferred levels of a variety of different taxes.

Q:B1 Thinking about the budget that Rachel Reeves is going to deliver on 26th November 2025, do you think the Labour Party’s decisions about where to save money and where to raise additional tax revenue are going to be fair or unfair?

Q:B2 Now we would like to ask you about some of the different types of taxes currently levied in the UK, which of them are too high or too low? [or currently about the right level]

The net percentage as a mean

The measure used here is the net percentage:

.       (%fair – %unfair) for question B1

.       (%too high – %too low) for question B2

This corresponds to a mean score obtained by scoring the opposing options -1 and +1 and 0 for the other options. The possible values range from -100 to +100.

The ordering and grouping of the parties

My report “Budget priorities: the parties and all of the people” suggested an ordering and grouping of parties to which I have added the Green Party at one extreme. Note that ‘All’ refers to all of the respondents. Group A and Group B are defined as indicated.

Green  Lab  LibDem       All   Cons Reform

Group B ………………     All   Group A ……..

Anticipation of fairness (Question B1)

“Q:B1 Thinking about the budget that Rachel Reeves is going to deliver on 26th November 2025, do you think the Labour Party’s decisions about where to save money and where to raise additional tax revenue are going to be fair or unfair?”

The measure here is the net percentage, %fair minus %unfair. The anticipated fairness was a substantial negative -37 for All of the respondents. Unsurprisingly the anticipated fairness peaked for Labour voters at +9 and fell away to the left and right of Labour along the ordering introduced above. So this is an example of a single-peaked value on a one-dimensional continuum.

-32   9      -23               -37   -61   -72

Green  Lab  LibDem       All   Cons Reform

Group B ………………     All   Group A ……..

The changes between adjacent parties/All were as indicated below. There was a fall of about 30 for each step away from the peak. There was a fall of -81 from Labour to Reform. Conservatives were quite close to Reform.

.    41       -32          -14       -24   -11

Green  Lab  LibDem       All   Cons Reform

Group B ………………     All   Group A ……..

Preferred level of taxation (Question B2) …

Q:B2 Now we would like to ask you about some of the different types of taxes currently levied in the UK, which of them are too high or too low? [or currently about the right level]

… All of the people

Table 1 below lists fourteen different taxes and shows the net percentage of All of the respondents saying each was too high. The taxes are listed in order of decreasing net percentage. The net percentage saying it was too high was positive for all but three of the taxes. Highest was for the Council tax referring perhaps to its prevalence and visibility. The lowest six taxes had a fairly even balance between ‘too high’ and ‘too low’. One of the lowest was the top rate of income tax. Also low were specific taxes on banks and oil and gas companies.

Table 1 Net percentage ‘too high’ for different taxes, for All of the respondents

Tax                          net percentage ‘too high’

         Too high

Council tax                                     62

VAT                                                45

Fuel duty                                        42

Stamp duty                                     37

Employers National Insurance       35

Employee National Insurance         34

Inheritance tax                        34

Basic rate of income tax                 32

Capital gains tax                             13

Higher rate of income tax                 4

         Not too high

Corporation tax                                 0

Top rate of income tax                    -  4

Specific taxes on banks                  -13

Specific taxes on oil & gas co        -16

… the parties

Table 2 below again lists the fourteen different taxes in the same order as above, namely in order of decreasing net percentage for All of the respondents saying each was too high. This time it lists the five parties and All in the ordering discussed earlier, giving the two Groups A and B.

The pattern Group B < All < Cons < Reform has few exceptions …

For every tax the following inequality holds. Group A has a higher ‘too high’ net percentage than Group B:

Group B < Group A

For every tax except VAT and basic income tax the following inequality holds. In these two cases All is greater than Cons by a very small amount. Otherwise:

Group B < All < Group A

For every tax except specific taxes on banks and oil & gas the following inequality holds. In these two cases Cons is greater than Reform by a very small amount, Otherwise:

Cons < Reform

Putting all this together we have that for most taxes:

Group B < All < Cons < Reform

Thus the lowest net percentage ‘too high’ is always a Group B party.

The ordering within Group B varies. In eight of the fourteen cases the Green Party has the lowest net percentage ‘too high’. These cases are fuel duty, stamp duty, inheritance tax, capital gains tax, corporation tax, top rate of income tax, specific taxes on banks and specific taxes on oil and gas. In the last five of these cases the net percentage for the Greens is that the tax is ‘too low’.

  In five of the fourteen cases the LibDems have the lowest net percentage ‘too high’. These cases are Council tax, VAT, Employee National Insurance, basic rate of income tax, and higher rate of income tax. In only one of these cases is the net percentage for the LibDems that the tax is ‘too low’.

  In one of the fourteen cases Labour has the lowest net percentage ‘too high’. However in this case the three Group B net percentages are almost identical: 24, 25 and 26.

Table 2 Net percentage ‘too high’ for different taxes and different parties/groups

‘x’ indicates the lowest net percentage ‘too high’

.                                                       Group B ………… All   Group A …

.                                                       G     L      LD   All   Cons Ref

Council tax                                     57    43    42x  62    66    77

VAT                                                41    34    30x  45    44    60

Fuel duty                                        22x  28    23    42    48    63

Stamp duty                                     15x  24    31    37    47    52

Employers National Insurance       26    24x  25    35    44    53

Employee National Insurance         30    29    20x  34    37    43

Inheritance tax                      1x  15    15    34    50    57

Basic rate of income tax                 27    20    16x  32    28    48

Capital gains tax                             -27x -1     2      13    22    33

Higher rate of income tax               -18   -1     -19x   4    15    18

Corporation tax                               -48x -11   -16     0    14    20

Top rate of income tax                    -39x -16   -23   -4     4      13

Specific taxes on banks                  -41x -19   -27   -13   1      -5

Specific taxes on oil & gas co        -54x -34   -35   -16   -5     -5

PART 2

To be continued.

Gordon Burt, November 2025

THE END