They are far too low, especially when offset against the costs. People rant and rave about tube drivers being on £65k a year, which is a decent wage to be fair.. but conveniently, folks forget that a 65k salary means that the take home of that is roughly £40k-£45k depending on pension deductions... £4k a month also sounds like a lot, until you lose £2500 for rent, £300 for council tax, £300 for gas/electricity and £100 for water and broadband.... Sure, they could move out of London and save a chunk on rent, but then they'd accrue transport costs, parking costs if that transport is by car and in many cases that wouldn't even be possible... the local council near the site I work at has just imposed permit parking restrictions that the residents don't use (their big fancy houses have space for 4-6 Range Rovers, so they aren't caring about roadside parking), so it all sits empty... the council's argument is that our staff should use public transport - only, that isn't really an option when you are driving the first or last buses of the day... As soon as it came in, we lost a load of staff as it simply wasn't worth their time or the hassle to carry on working with us.
For decades my brother in law has lived and worked abroad but invested his savings in Britain. That was until they changed the tax laws that meant he would not only be paying tax in the country he earned his money and tax on his savings but an additional tax because he wasn't living over here. His savings are now invested abroad.
The trouble with Labour governments is they dont like people who do their best to look after themselves, they always end up raiding ordinary peoples savings, while never really tackling the super rich. I'm still waiting for Reeves to fiddle with ISAs tax exemption. Just needs the next black hole.
@Fat Controller Privatising rail and buses was a big mistake. I can remember when teaching English to scientists in Gembloux their shock when some were muttering about the annual rail season ticket from Gembloux to Brussels went up to 1000€. It's a similar lenght train journey to Reading to Paddington and that was set to up to £5000. Investment in decent public transport is one of the things that could be done with a millionaire's tax. On another front entirely, Trumpy tantrums about drugs coming into the USA from Canada's "porous" border have led to Trumpy tariffs and Canada imposing rstrictions on cross border movements for hunters, fishers, etc that used to be done on an honesty basis. Canada has recently seized a US truck carrying a hidden load of 266kg of methamphetamine into Ontario. Using Trump's Venezuela logic Canada can now blow up US trucks on the highways, seize oil tankers and kidnap Trump to charge him with corruption.
Yes, she was muttering something about possibly protecting the state pension from falling into a tax trap, but not private pensions, which protects those who did not save for their retirement and rely wholly on the state, while penalising those who did plan ahead but who might not have the NI yrs for a full state pension.
The money is already there for a better service - they are instead blowing it all on "net zero" and electrifying the fleet.
I've recently got my new tax code come through and as far as I can work out after April I will be paying tax on my state pension, but they have just moved that amount over onto my small private pension and will collect it from there. That is what it looks like they are doing anyway.
They'll probably be doing that because they can shift your tax code making collection simpler. Goodness knows how that will play out for anyone that only has the state pension though
I assume they will have to own up and blatantly take tax from your pension before they give it to you.
From what I've been told, they don't have a mechanism in place to do that. If that is true then I guess the pensioner will have to make a tax return and pay that way.
They seem to be at great pains recently to say that the state pension is a 'benefit' - - I didn't know that benefits were taxable....
I'm not sure this is the right thread to post this under but can't see anything which might be more appropriate (feel free to move it if there is) The 'traveller' community gets a lot of bad press, much of it well deserved, so I was a bit apprehensive when I went into our local today to see a large number of them, adults and children. Last dealings I had with this community was getting out of the way of a garden bench that was being hurled through the window of a different pub! This large group was very well behaved, and I found it quite touching when a couple of the older kids, probably early teens, walked to the bar with all the plates from their meals neatly stacked, and asked where they should put them. No sarky comments please.
Yes, they will skim it off your private pension. They are doing the same to me ... and I don't even owe any tax. I'm not sure whether, having now changed my tax code back again, they can put back what they've taken or whether I have to claim it. They keep telling me to log in to see and I keep telling them I can't get verified.
The Gov is reducing the cash ISA limit to £12,000 for under 65s. And the tax rate on savings is going up by 2% April 2027. Just something that sprung to mind. The personal tax account that they love to get you to log into is so messy. Not worth looking at. Badly laid out the last time I looked.
