I’ll start this post with a disclaimer… I am not an economist. Or given usually to political statements. But the world is f##ked, so hey whatever.

I am fundamentally left wing. I always have been.  Since I was a student voting tactically in my first ever general election to try to oust the sitting Tory MP. (That failed by the way). Probably before. My parents read the Guardian.

I was lucky enough to be a student in the times of grants and free higher education and (can you believe this) Housing Benefit. I had a comfortable up bringing. Not luxurious but comfortable. I have never been stuck for the sake of £100. I have a family that can support me if needed.

My kids have the same. More so. They are incredibly lucky.

And the thing that annoys me more than anything else at the moment is that no electable party will stand up and do the decent thing and admit that income tax needs to rise.

How have we become a nation so determined to hold onto every piece of wealth (for being able to make ends meet and have a car, phone, TV, food is wealth) at the expense of everything else?

At the expense of people worse off than us.

At the expense of foreign aid (but then hey don’t come here either…)

At the expense of national security.

At the expense of our ability to actually carry on living on this planet.

How is it right that celebrities can go into space for 11 minutes and spout utter nonsense whilst people are starving?

What have we become.

And yes, there are always people hit worse by changes in tax. The squeezed middle. I’d rather be squeezed there than as a disabled person on benefits or a migrant from a war torn country whose crops have failed due to our fossil fuel burning, or as a child in care, or as someone waiting 24 months for a routine operation, or as a victim waiting for their time in court, as a pensioner sitting in the cold, or a family in temporary accommodation, or even a teenager trying to get a driving test.

We need to wise up. And pay for what is needed. Most people won’t even notice 1p or 2p on income tax.

It’s fairest. It’s easiest. And it just needs doing.

FFS.