This morning, the leading candidates in the upcoming General Election – Jeremy Corbyn of the Labour Party and Theresa May of the Conservative Party – gave speeches this morning. Corbyn did not take any questions from journalists straight after his speech, but May, who is currently the Prime Minister and campaigning to keep it that way, did, and here’s the key points to take away from the Q&A, which took place in York. However, this didn’t give her much leverage over Corbyn, since her answers were riddled with inaccuracies.
May refused to rule out in increase in NICs
May refused to rule out the possibility of an increase in increasing national insurance contributions (NICs). Labour has made a conscientious promise not to raise employee NICs, but May – while making it clear that she does not have the “intention to increase the level of tax” – dubiously said that she doesn’t want to make promises she wasn’t “absolutely sure” she could keep.
May made a false claim that her proposal to put a price cap on energy bills was different from Ed Miliband’s own proposal. She said that Miliband proposed a price freeze that would’ve prevented prices from going up or down, but she was bang wrong. When she was informed that she was using a 2015 Labour plan, she said, “You are wrong.” She said, “Miliband suggested a freeze on energy prices...and, crucially, the prices could not have gone down.
Under our cap, prices will be able to go down.” But no, she was wrong. The price freeze section of Labour’s 2015 manifesto clearly states that they would “freeze energy bills until 2017, ensuring that bills can fall but not rise.” So, hah.
