Councillor Prendergast Challenges Southport Lib Dem's Tax and Benefits Proposals

Conservative Leader on Sefton Council, Mike Prendergast, is calling on Southport Lib Dem’s to explain how much extra tax they would look to take from Southport and Sefton residents to fund a proposed change to the current benefits system.

At the recent Sefton Council meeting, Lib Dem’s put forward a motion supporting the payment of more benefits and said it could be financed by increasing tax on businesses and individuals.

Councillor Prendergast said, “We all want to see the living standards of all children improve and central government has provided unprecedented support over the last few years to support the most vulnerable households.

This has included around £40 billion of support this year, billions in support last year with the most vulnerable households receiving the most support.  We’ve also had the recent announcement of expansion of childcare hours for families and all of this comes on top of over £400 billion of support provided by the government during the pandemic when the majority of salaries of around 14.7 million people were covered by the furlough scheme.

Many people in Sefton will feel thought that a cap on certain benefits, is a sensible and proportionate way of providing help without being an unlimited cost to the taxpayer.

It seems that local Lib Dem’s are trying to woo Labour voters in Bootle with policies which appear to have no limit in terms of their potential cost. It’s clear the Lib Dem’s in Southport, now supported by Labour as well, are in favour of increasing general taxation in a never ending cycle of tax and spend. This would be bad for businesses and households.

As Conservatives, we firmly believe that your money is better in your pocket and we certainly won’t be supporting Southport Lib Dem’s and Labour in their quest to tax more and more and take money off hardworking people and businesses in Southport.

This irresponsible approach to the public purse makes it harder for Sefton residents to tell Lib Dem’s apart from Labour. It’s looking very much the case that if people in Sefton vote Lib Dem, they will end up with Labour policies, vote Lib get Lab.

So many times we have seen Lib Dem’s vote with Labour in Sefton; at the next set of Local Elections only the Conservatives in Sefton will be providing the real opposition to Sefton Labour.”