Andy Burnham is facing fresh pressure from a key ally to introduce a 2 per cent wealth tax on Britain’s richest people.

Compass, the Labour Party pressure group headed by Neil Lawson, is fronting a new report which includes calls for wealth tax reform.

Lawson is also co-founder of Mainstream Labour, the Burnham-backed faction set up in August last year.

The report, titled , proposes a 2 per cent levy on net wealth above £10m, which it says would raise £24bn a year from around 22,000 people – just 0.03 per cent of the population.

It also calls for capital gains tax to be equalised with income tax, which it says would raise a further £11bn from the very richest.

Lawson invoked Burnham’s own rhetoric in making the case for the policy, saying the PM will not end “business as usual” without tax reform.

Left-wing backing

His intervention comes as MPs on the left of Labour step up calls for Burnham to use his first Budget on 28 October to announce policies aimed at redistributing wealth.

Neil Duncan-Jordan, MP for Poole, said Chancellor John Healey’s first fiscal statement “needs to indicate a fundamental redistribution of wealth”.

His own wish list goes beyond the report’s asks, calling additionally for taxes on energy companies that have benefited from the Iran conflict and for a higher income tax threshold.

He said such measures would “give people more money in their pockets and show a clear sense of direction as to whose side the Government is on.”

Jon Trickett, MP for Normanton and Hemsworth, said he backed a “carefully calibrated wealth tax set sufficiently high as not to impact on the overwhelming majority”. Such a levy would “both raise significant funds to help achieve progressive policies but also help to resolve the moral outrage of uncontrolled inequality”, he added.

Andy McDonald – the Middlesbrough and Thornaby East MP who resigned as shadow employment secretary in 2021 in protest at Sir Keir Starmer’s leadership – said the idea deserved serious consideration.

“We should seriously consider a wealth tax,” he said. “It warrants proper analysis and investigation, as does a replacement of council tax.”

Growing pressure

The calls add to mounting pressure on Burnham from allies within his own party to act on wealth taxation before the Budget.

Lord Kinnock, the former Labour leader who continues to advise Burnham, told The i Paper this month that there should be a “better balance” between the taxation of earnings and wealth, and urged the Prime Minister to equalise capital gains tax with income tax rates.

A poll for The i Paper by BMG Research found 66 per cent of adults back a wealth tax on assets worth more than £10m, with majorities of Labour, Conservative and Reform UK voters all in favour.

Steve Rotheram, the Liverpool City Region Mayor and one of Burnham’s closest political allies, has urged him to frame a wealth tax around investment rather than punishment, telling The i Paper last month the case should not be “we’re going to tax you because you’ve got a few bob”.

Burnham has so far declined to rule out the policy. Asked directly about a wealth tax in an interview with the broadcaster Gary Lineker before entering No 10, he said: “I’m not going to rule things out right now.”

He added that he wanted “a greater sense of fairness” but did not want to “create new divisions” or be seen as “demonising one group”.

Approached over similar proposals earlier this month, a Treasury spokesperson said tax decisions “are a matter for the Chancellor to set out at fiscal events, rather than routinely commenting on proposals made”.

Wider demands

The report is also backed by Tax Justice UK, the Independent Media Association and Make Votes Matter. It goes beyond tax, setting out a wider set of demands the coalition wants political parties to adopt before the next general election, expected in 2029.

On media, it calls for the BBC to be put under public rather than government control, and for stricter, compulsory regulation of national newspapers. It also proposes a new tax on large media owners, with the proceeds used to fund public-interest journalism.

On voting, the report calls for a move to proportional representation, and for the existing £100,000 cap on political donations from overseas donors to be extended to everyone, including UK-based donors.