Reform UK has pledged to increase the HMRC personal tax-free allowance to £15,000, a move the party says would save most taxpayers £500 a year and take 2.9 million people out of income tax altogether. Robert Jenrick, the party’s Treasury spokesperson, made the announcement at the party conference in Birmingham.
Jenrick, who is also the party’s economic spokesman, said the tax cut would be introduced within the first 100 days if he became chancellor, describing it as providing “money that people really need right now”. The policy would raise the tax-free threshold by £2,430 from its current level, which has been frozen since 2021.
Cost and funding of the tax cut
According to Reform UK’s estimates, the policy would cost £17.7 billion in its first year, rising to £21 billion by the fifth year. The party says it could be paid for through £80 billion of public spending cuts it plans to make.
Speaking at the conference, Jenrick said: “As chancellor, I will wake each morning with one purpose. To make Britain a better place to be a worker than it was the day before.” He highlighted that 1.3 million people were dragged into paying tax in the last year alone, blaming the freeze on the tax-free allowance.
Criticism of the allowance freeze
Jenrick criticised the current freeze, which has been extended by Labour until 2031. He said: “That betrayal costs a full-time worker on the minimum wage more than £750 a year. And now for the first time, the freeze means they're going to be taxing the state pension. What a disgrace.”
He also made a personal commitment to deliver the tax cut, stating that if he failed to do so in his first Budget, he would resign as chancellor. “No ifs, no buts, I'll be gone,” he said.
Donation row and reaction
The announcement came as Nigel Farage acknowledged that the overseas donation row engulfing Reform UK “looks bad” for the party but denied it had ever taken foreign money in breach of electoral law. In an interview with the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg, Farage described the comments as “injudicious at best” and admitted the optics of undercover filming were problematic.
Farage said: “This looks bad, as does the sale of peerages, as does government contracts for donations. We are not the first people to be involved in a row over donations.” Asked about the incident by Jon Sopel on Sky News’s Sunday Morning programme, Jenrick responded: “Oh, boohoo. We’re now in a country, Jon, where somebody who is – whatever she is – a far-left protester, goes into a party conference, tries to wreck the leader’s speech, and cries foul if a pensioner knocks her over the head with their Zimmer frame. I mean, come on, get a life.”
The tax pledge and the donation row dominated the party’s conference in Birmingham, with Reform UK seeking to position itself on tax policy while defending its funding practices.
