Brace yourselves, warned top insurance lobbying outfit ABI this week.
As wind-burned post-ecstatic witches packed away their sabbath paraphernalia this Sunday morning, weekend-working tax men were busy at the crank handles remorselessly winching IPT up from 6% to an eye-watering 9.5%.
The effect of this increase, ABI people warn, will not be good.
IPT (Insane Punishment Tax) is a levy designed to discourage people from buying insurance.
Not that they need much discouragement these days, with an estimated one million Brits not even bothering with supposedly compulsory things like motor insurance.
As of 1 November, ABI spokesbeings claim, more will need to be paid for 7 million motor policies, 5 million household policies, 3 million pet policies, and 3 million private medical insurance policies.
The effect will be to leave the average two-car family with pets and PMI a couple of monkeys short come Christmas.
ABI front man Jimmy “Duellin’” Dalton rued that fact that (with insurers reluctantly forced to pass the full impact on to policyholders) “millions of people across the country face being hit in the pocket by this rise in IPT.”
As anyone who’s ever had the misfortune to be hit in the pocket will surely attest, this is no cause for celebration. Unless, of course, you happen to be George Osborne and don’t much care who faces getting hit in the pocket, or hit in the face for that matter, as long as there’s a couple of quid in it for your precious exchequer.
Unlike things like Champagne, caviar and tampons, Jimmy D insists insurance is a “financial safety net, not a luxury,” and as such should probably be subsidised not subjected to outrageous levies like Insane Punishment Tax.
Well said Jim, we say at Bankstone News.
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