Starmer, the One Percenter

Labour leader made £211,000 last year, including £85,000 capital gains

SIR Keir Starmer’s income was more than £210,000 last year, pushing him into the country’s top one per cent of earners.

A day after rishi Sunak published his tax return, the labour leader followed suit and revealed his very healthy earnings.

Sir Keir received £126,154 for being an MP and leader of the Opposition in 2021/22, the tax return showed.

And he made capital gains of £85,466, on which he paid £23,930 capital gains tax.

He said the earnings were linked to the sale of a house he helped his sister to buy.

The tax return showed he paid a total of £67,033 in tax, up from £51,547 the previous financial year.

Last week Sir Keir accused chancellor Jeremy Hunt of prioritising Britain’s richest one per cent in his Spring Budget, a category he now falls into.

The Prime Minister’s tax return, released on Wednesday, showed he paid more than £1million in UK tax over the previous three financial years.

Mr Sunak paid £432,493 in tax in 2021/2022, £393,217 in 2020/ 2021, and £ 227,350 in 2019/20.

Last year his income from dividends was £172,415, with £1.6 million from capital gains.

Sir Keir attacked plans unveiled by the chancellor in last week’s Budget to abolish the tax-free limit of £1.07million on pensions savings.

He pledged to reverse the measure if he wins the election during a speech yesterday.

On Wednesday he was accused of ‘hypocrisy’ after it was revealed he is himself exempt from tax rules due to a deal established under the then labour government from his time as Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP). the ‘tax unregistered’ scheme means the lifetime allowance does not apply to his contributions while DPP between 2008 and 2013.

But during yesterday’s keynote speech in Stoke-on-trent, he said: ‘i am absolutely committed to changing what the government did last week – let me go further than that. i don’t intend that to exclude me.’

Sir Keir’s civil service pension is understood to not be large enough to incur a tax charge under the pension cap system on its own, and he has not paid into it since 2013.