A MEMBER of the public who repeatedly hit out at the Labour Party's tax plans on BBC Question Time has inspired a strong reaction online.

The man, who spoke on last night's show from The University of Bolton Stadium, refused to believe that he fell within the top five percent of the country's earners and called former MP Richard Burgon a "liar".

A BBC tweet showing a clip of the show has been retweeted more than a thousand times, with 3,700 people liking the post and 3,900 people leaving comments.

When asked to put a question to the panel, the audience member told viewers his £80,000-a-year salary was "nowhere near in the top five percent" and claimed he was not even in the top half of earners in the UK.

Despite attempts from Mr Burgon and host Fiona Bruce to explain that this was not the case, the man refused to back down.

"I would like to call out Labour as liars, I am one of those people that he will tax more and I am nowhere near in the top five percent," he said.

"So I'm calling you a liar right now, that five percent is a lie, I'm nowhere near that and you're going to income tax me as an employee.

"You're not going after the billionaires you're going after the employees where it's easy money because it's PAYE and I have no choice."

 

 

In response, Labour's Mr Burgon, who is standing to gain another team as MP for Leeds East, said: "I'm afraid on that you're mistaken, we're not going to raise income tax for anybody apart from the top 5 percent of earners."

Government figures released in 2016/17 put those earning above £75,300 annually before tax as being amongst the top five percent of taxpayers in the country.

And, the Labour Party have recently revealed plans to increase the tax paid by people earning between £80,000 and £125,000.

However, the decision has inspired anger from some voters and continued to draw the ire of the Question Time audience member.

He said: "I'm not [in the top five percent] every doctor in this country earns more than that. Every doctor, every accountant, every solicitor earns more than that."

Mr Burgon responded: "It's not true that every solicitor in the country earns more than £80,000 when I was a solicitor I earned just over £40,000 a year."

The exchange has drawn mixed reaction on social media.

One commenter with the handle @EdwardBedivere, said: "Wish I earned £80k. No mate, you're not the victim here."

Another, called @shillcock_paul added: "If he earns just over £80k per year his income tax will go up by about £10 per month.

"Is he for real?"

A further commenter, @LeoCrusher, said: "Amazing to see you can earn £80k in this country with a total inability to understand percentages."