Inequality & fair shares: where the UK parties stand
Is the gap between the richest and the rest getting wider or narrower?
Independent, source-checked analysis of how each party’s policies would affect this — judged on the evidence, without telling the system who proposed them. How this works.
Labour — 21 policies affect this: 14 helps · 5 mixed · 2 little effect. Compare interactively →
Close Tax Loopholes and Modernise HMRC — helps. These measures all target the wealthiest — non-doms, offshore trust users, private equity managers, and large-business tax avoiders — so the distribution of gains clearly tilts toward narrowing the ga…
Bring Railways into Public Ownership and Reform Bus Services — helps. Bringing railways into public ownership removes shareholder dividends and contract profits from the system, which modestly narrows the gap between capital owners and lower-income transport users. Bus …
Support Small Businesses and Post Offices, and Address Horizon Scandal — helps. These policies modestly tilt resources toward small businesses, deprived regions, and people harmed by the Horizon scandal — all of which narrows specific dimensions of the inequality gap. But most me…
Increase Social and Affordable Housing — helps. Expanding social rented housing and curbing Right to Buy helps lower-income households most, narrowing the gap in housing costs between rich and poor. The improvement is likely modest, as even the bes…
Deepen Devolution Across England and Support Local Government — helps. Funding targeted at deprived areas and public-sector pay improvements could modestly narrow income and regional gaps, but delivery risks, potential urban bias, and retained central control mean the re…
Conservative — 23 policies affect this: 7 hurts · 6 helps · 5 mixed · 3 little effect · 2 genuinely contested. Compare interactively →
Cut Employee National Insurance — hurts. Cutting employee NI from 12% to 6% gives bigger absolute gains to middle-to-higher earners, while lower earners may end up worse off once frozen tax thresholds are factored in — so the gap between the…
Reform Child Benefit Household Income Threshold — hurts. This reform increases Child Benefit for households earning up to £160,000, a group the Guardian identifies as sitting in the top 20% — or even top 2% — of earners. While it fixes a genuine horizontal …
Ensure Access to Cash and Banking Hubs — helps. Protecting cash access disproportionately benefits lower-income, disabled, and rural people who rely on cash more than wealthier, digitally-connected groups — so it modestly narrows the gap. The effec…
Invest £36 Billion in Local Transport Infrastructure — helps. By concentrating most of the £36 billion in the North and Midlands, the policy could narrow regional inequality — but much of the spending may not be genuinely new, and effects won't land until 2029–2…
Maintain National Living Wage — helps. Keeping the National Living Wage tied to two-thirds of median earnings will continue lifting the pay of millions of low-paid workers relative to the median, narrowing the income gap at the bottom. How…
Liberal Democrat — 43 policies affect this: 29 helps · 5 mixed · 4 little effect · 3 genuinely contested · 2 hurts. Compare interactively →
Reverse Conservative Bank Tax Cuts and Impose Windfall Tax on Energy Companies — helps. By raising taxes on large bank profits and energy company super-profits — both of which flow disproportionately to wealthy shareholders — this policy shifts the tax burden toward the top of the income…
Raise Income Tax Personal Allowance — hurts. Raising the personal allowance cuts tax for workers already paying income tax, but gives nothing to the very lowest earners who earn below the threshold — so the gains are skewed toward middle and hig…
Reform Capital Gains Tax — helps. Reforming capital gains tax to close loopholes and raise rates would likely narrow the gap between the richest and the rest, since capital gains are overwhelmingly concentrated at the very top. The ma…
Abolish Residential Leaseholds and Cap Ground Rents — helps. This policy shifts significant money from freeholder investors to leaseholders by capping ground rents and protecting leaseholders from cladding costs — narrowing the gap between property owners who e…
Extend Rail Electrification and Improve Stations — helps. By targeting the North and improving disabled access, this policy could narrow regional and disability-related inequality — but only if delivered at scale, which past rail projects suggest is far from…
Reform UK — 27 policies affect this: 18 hurts · 4 mixed · 3 genuinely contested · 2 helps. Compare interactively →
Freeze non-essential immigration — hurts. Freezing non-essential immigration is likely to widen inequality slightly over the long run: any small wage gains for low-skilled workers are outweighed by larger fiscal pressures that require higher …
Impose 5-year residency and employment requirement for benefits — hurts. By denying benefits to people in their first five years in the UK — who are disproportionately lower-paid workers — this policy widens the gap between the richest and poorest residents. The main cavea…
Replace the 2010 Equalities Act and scrap DE&I rules — hurts. Removing the Equality Act's anti-discrimination protections would likely widen income and employment gaps for groups — women, ethnic minorities, disabled people — who are already at the bottom of the …
Raise income tax threshold to £20,000 — hurts. Raising the income tax threshold to £20,000 and the higher rate threshold to £70,000 would give the biggest gains to higher earners, widening the gap between rich and poor. Independent analysts find t…
Cut residential stamp duty — hurts. This stamp duty cut delivers the largest cash savings to buyers of more expensive homes, so it disproportionately benefits wealthier households. Evidence also suggests a significant share of any savin…
Green — 21 policies affect this: 16 helps · 3 mixed · 1 hurts · 1 genuinely contested. Compare interactively →
Introduce free personal social care and reform the care workforce — helps. This policy narrows the inequality gap in two ways: it lifts pay and conditions for care workers who are among the lowest-paid in the economy, and it removes catastrophic care costs that currently wip…
Restore and improve disability benefits and support — helps. Restoring and uplifting disability benefits directs money to a group already more likely to be in poverty, which narrows the income gap. The main caveat is that the scale depends on whether the policy…
Build new social homes and end Right to Buy — helps. More social homes at below-market rents would directly reduce housing costs for lower-income households, narrowing the gap between the richest and the rest. The main caveat is whether 150,000 homes a …
Invest in home insulation, green heating, and climate adaptation for homes — helps. Subsidised insulation and heating upgrades, if well-targeted, should narrow the gap because lower-income households live disproportionately in the worst-insulated homes and stand to gain most in relat…
Achieve a zero-carbon economy through energy transition and green investment — helps. The policy includes several mechanisms aimed at narrowing inequality — community energy ownership, regional banks, and funded retraining for workers in poorer, carbon-heavy regions — but the provided …