The U.K. is canceling plans to impose a major tax cut for the nation’s top tax bracket following widespread frustration and market chaos, U.K. Prime Minister Liz Truss announced Monday.
Truss’ plan had called for eliminating the U.K.’s highest tax bracket, resulting in a major cut for citizens making more than $168,000 annually. Truss and her government stood against criticism of the plan for weeks, arguing that it would create economic growth amid fears of a recession.
She nevertheless backed down on the plan with a Monday tweet.
“We get it and we have listened,” she wrote. “The abolition of the 45pc rate had become a distraction from our mission to get Britain moving. Our focus now is on building a high growth economy that funds world-class public services, boosts wages, and creates opportunities across the country.”
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Liz Truss meets supporters at a Conservative Party leadership election hustings at the NEC, Birmingham, England, Tuesday, Aug. 23, 2022.
(AP Photo/Rui Vieira, File)
The British’ Pound’s value plummeted to near-parity with the U.S. dollar when Chancellor of the Exchequer Kwasi Kwarteng first announced Truss’s tax cut plan in late September.
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The Pound has now risen to roughly $1.12 following Monday’s announcement, up from a record low of $1.03.
Truss’ government has faced extensive political backlash as well, with the country’s left-wing Labor Party gaining extensive support in polls. The Labor Party enjoyed a 19-point lead over Truss’s Conservative Party in a Saturday poll, according to Reuters.
A general view of the Houses of Parliament on the river Thames in London. (Associated Press)
(AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth, File)
Truss finds her government in a dire position less than a month after taking office on Sept. 5.
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Her Labor Party opponents have reportedly taken to referring to the nation’s economic crisis as “the Trussterf—.”
Fox News’ Adam Shaw contributed to this report.
