Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg yesterday set out plans to cut tax credits for families on above-average incomes and slash almost £1bn from the government’s road-building programme to help pay for childcare and education priorities.

Most amusing. The assistant comment page editor at The Guardian complains that he’ll be hard hit, as the father of five, by the changes in child benefit. Just to let you know, assistant comment page editor is quite a senior position. So let, us now deploy one of the guardianistas favourite arguments about, say, tax credits. That they

Tax credits are bound to be a shambles because they have to be too complicated to work properly, even if the computer systems and the staff were perfect, which they are not. These figures come from a parliamentary answer: Repeat overpayments 1.8m families have been overpaid tax credits more than once in the four years that the system has been running, an increase of 400,000 in just one year. That ...

The A-Level pass rate has risen for the 28th successive year. Debasing the coinage. It's what governments do....

The multi-millionaire columnist Polly Toynbee is this morning ranting against tax dodging corporations in the Guardian. The paper has even set up a campaigning website with fancy interactive graphics. According to the their own annual report Guardian Media Group made £306.4 million before tax. Using astute tax planning and legal manipulation of the tax laws; such as the use of an equity owning tr...

The central member of a gang who stole more than £3m of tax credits has been jailed for five years, following an international investigation by HMRC. Tax credits are wide open to fraud. Lithuanian Ricardas Virokaitis was the linchpin of a gang who paid Eastern European women to come to the UK solely to register for benefits and tax credits. Virokaitis and his criminal colleagues escorted the...

The Guardian publishes today what appears to be a well-briefed article suggesting the Lib Dems are thinking of deferring plans to scrap Council Tax in favour of a local income tax: Liberal Democrats are planning to soften their support for a local income tax to replace the council tax, a key policy for at least three

Today’s Guardian reports: In an exclusive letter published in the Guardian today, a cross-denominational group of religious leaders, led by the Church of England Board of Education, defends selection of some students and staff on the basis of commitment to their faith. The letter comes ahead of a policy debate on 5-19 education in England at

The Guardian today carries a story that the Liberal Democrats are to soften their stance on replacing Council Tax with a local income tax. Similar to William Hague’s strategy with regard to the Euro, Vince Cable – the Lib Dem...

Following David Cameron’s misleading claim on Sunday that he would not cut Child Tax Credits from those on incomes below £50,000, the Prime Minister and the Chancellor have stepped up Labour’s attack on the real Tory plan to cut Child Tax Credits from those on much lower incomes.