And it’s more like half if you include employer’s NI.

“even if you need every penny of it to survive, the Government will make you hand over a lump and then give it back, ceremoniously, via its huge and expensive bureaucracy”

She’s right that you will have to hand it over. However, she’s wrong to say that the government will hand it back. In most cases it won’t. This is largely because tax credits tend to be based on household, not individual, income. For example, two adults each earning about £15,000 p.a. with a child don’t qualify for working tax credit, so they will only lose as a result of Brown’s income tax changes.

Brown’s abolition of the 10% income tax (which was in itself a gimmick anyway – it would have been more effective just to have a higher personal allowance) was designed to rob lower earners to earn himself a quick parliamentary advantage. Brown is a dishonest and incompetent man entirely lacking in conscience or decency.