Rt Hon Sir Keir Starmer MP Prime Minister
10 Downing Street
London
SW1A 2AA
Dear Prime Minister,
We are writing to underscore our very deep concern about the social and economic consequences of rising wealth inequality. We are at a very dangerous moment. Government failure to act decisively to protect ordinary people has destroyed trust in politics. Your latest budget does nothing to restore that trust. While you continue to pay more heed to the millionaire bond traders than the electorate, social unrest is brewing.
Britain is broken because the super rich are pocketing billions, whilst ordinary people struggle to get by. Since 1990 the wealth of the super-rich has skyrocketed, with the 50 richest families now holding more wealth than the poorest 34 million. More than a third of us now earn less than we need to buy life’s essentials. [1][2]
Young people, especially, are in crisis. Facing rising unemployment, a never ending cost of living crisis, extortionate rents and being locked out of home ownership forever. Our present is blighted by our moral outrage over your government’s support for genocide in Gaza, and our future will be one of ever worsening climate breakdown.
It doesn’t have to be this way. Why should the rich pay a lower effective tax rate than the hard working majority? Fair tax would mean the wealthy pay their fair share, so we can have functioning public services, whilst tackling the threat of rising temperatures and lifting more kids out of poverty. To fix Britain we have to tax the rich. [3]
We don’t pretend to be experts, but when the millionaires themselves are asking to be taxed more and saying your budget does not go far enough; when trade unions, think tanks, economists and NGOs are demanding higher taxes on wealth, and when three quarters of the British public would support higher taxes on the wealthy, it is incomprehensible that your government has failed to deliver. [4]
We get that it’s complicated, but democracy is about freedom, fairness and the right to contribute to the important decisions which affect our lives. That is why we are demanding that you let ordinary people decide how to tax wealth, through the means of a legally binding citizen’s assembly- a House of the People. [5]
Take Back Power is demanding that the UK government makes a statement that it will immediately establish a permanent House of the People, with powers to tax extreme wealth in order to fix Britain.
Until this happens, it is our duty to undertake nonviolent direct action, in order to demand the changes necessary to protect the people of this country from the super-rich, who are driving us towards collapse. We remain open to dialogue with the UK government should you wish to negotiate.
Take Back Power.
Appendix
[1] Billionaire Britain 2025, The Equality Trust. https://equalitytrust.org.uk/evidence-base/billionaire-britain-2025/
[2] Households living below a Minimum Income Standard: 2008–2023, Joseph Rowntree Foundation, February 2025. https://www.jrf.org.uk/households-living-below-a-minimum-income-standard-2008-2023
[3] The under-taxation of wealth in the UK, background note to The Taxing Wealth Report 2024, Richard Murphy FAcSS FCA FAIA (Hon), Professor of Accounting Practice, Sheffield University Management School. https://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/Wealth-tax-background-report-published.pdf
[4] Three quarters of Britons support wealth taxes on millionaires, Yougov January 2023 https://yougov.co.uk/politics/articles/45044-three-quarters-britons-support-wealth-taxes-millio
[5] The House of the People is a new people-led democratic institution in the UK: a standing Citizens’ Assembly designed to replace the unelected House of Lords and restore trust in democracy by placing real power in the hands of regular people.
