Reform’s by-election candidate suggested people who don’t have children should pay more tax
A blog post has revealed that Reform England’s candidate for the by-election in Gorton and Denton has suggested extra taxes should be imposed as a penalty on people who do not have children.
In a proposal compared to the dystopian novel ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’, a fictional drama in which women are forced to bear children to combat a fertility crisis, Matt Goodwin suggested a “negative child benefit tax” be imposed on “childless people”.
While both men and women would be financially affected by such a tax, it would disproportionately affect women by putting pressure on both genders to get pregnant to avoid the tax.
Mr Goodwin also suggested the government “abolish personal income tax for women with two or more children”.
Writing on the Substack blog in 2023, the former university academic and honorary president of the organization Students4Reform argued that the “British family is collapsing” and claimed that what he claimed was “very real and very negative impacts on the country around us”.
In a list of suggestions for strengthening family values in Britain, he suggested: “Creating a pro-family culture by having a national day to celebrate families and parenting. Symbolizing this new culture with things like families receiving a telegram from the King when they have a third child.”
“Reinforcing the importance of family in the curriculum. Changing child benefit to encourage families to have more children. Introducing a ‘negative child benefit’ tax for those who are childless.
“Sacrificing more land for cheaper family homes. And, in my view, prioritizing British families when building new housing projects.”
He added: “These are all things we can discuss and develop right now in Britain, where the collapse of the family is not only becoming inevitable but is having very real and very negative impacts on the country around us.”
Labor deputy leader Lucy Powell said: Independent The proposal would “penalize millions of women and deprive them of their basic dignity of choice.”
He said: “Matthew Goodwin’s big idea is so ridiculous you’d be forgiven for thinking it was something out of The Handmaid’s Tale.
“It will punish millions of women and deprive them of their basic dignity of choice.”
In the dystopian drama, fertile women known as Handmaids are enslaved to bear children for elite couples during the fertility crisis in the United States.
Ms Powell added: “Nigel Farage’s Reformation is more interested in dividing people than bringing them together.
“This is the kind of divisive politics we need to stop Reform from gaining a foothold in Manchester by defeating the extreme candidate. The only way to do that is to vote Labor in Gorton and Denton. Voting for any other party risks letting Reform in.”
Mr Goodwin was announced as Reform UK’s candidate in the by-elections in Gorton and Denton last week. Speaking at the opening of the party’s campaign office on Thursday, Reform leader Nigel Farage claimed the party’s campaign was off to a “very, very good start”, although polls show it is fast becoming a two-horse race between Reform and Labour.
Mr Goodwin, who appears as a presenter on GB News three times a week, sparked criticism last year when he was accused of suggesting that people from minority ethnic backgrounds were not necessarily British, even if they were born in the UK.
Following a mass stabbing on a train in Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire, Mr Goodwin blamed “mass uncontrolled immigration” in a post on X/Twitter.
After it was revealed the suspect was born in the UK, Goodwin wrote: “So were all the 7/7 bombers. It takes more than a piece of paper to make someone ‘British’.”
The comments were criticized by the Liberal Democrats as “racist rhetoric” and a “disgrace”.
And in 2017, after the politics professor incorrectly predicted that Labor would not get as much as 38 per cent of the vote under Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership Brexit: Why did Britain vote to leave the European Union? He ate pages from his book live on Sky News. The party received 40 percent of the votes.
A Reform spokesman said: “This is once again disingenuous by the Labor Party. This is an idea first put forward by the respected demographer Paul Moreland as part of a suite of measures that need to be debated and debated across developed countries if we are serious about tackling the looming demographic crisis.”
“The Labor government has stuck its head in the sand when it comes to thinking about the long-term challenges facing Britain. We need a grown-up, mature debate about how we can encourage people to have more children and support British families.”
