Labour must call election before 6th April 2010

Following the announcement yesterday that the government will tax anybody earning over £150,000 at a rate of 50%, I have been reviewing their manifesto from 2005. It explicitly states towards the bottom of page 16:

"We will not raise the basic or top rates of income tax in the next Parliament."

There are no caveats or hedging. This is not open to interpretation of what the top rate of income tax means like Labour tried to argue when they abandoned their pledge to hold a referendum on the European Constitution.

If Labour go to the country before 6th April 2010 (when it will come into effect) with this tax change in their manifesto, and they win, then they can have a fresh mandate to make this change. Otherwise this is a blatant reneging on a major plank of their manifesto and there is no reason to ever believe anything else that they put in a future manifesto.

This is a point that the opposition parties should hammer home again and again.