Hot on the heels of the revelations of Labour run Knowsley Council’s plans to exhibit at the Labour Party conference in Manchester next month the deficit deniers have now tabled a motion criticising the Coalition plans to raise VAT to 20% from January next year.

As has been said before by many commentators Labour’s criticism and moral outrage about the VAT increase lacks any credibility whatsoever when it has been confirmed by none other than Alastair Darling, the now Shadow Chancellor, that he had also wanted to raise VAT when in office.Darling conceded in an interview with Andrew Marr that details of his plans to increase VAT revealed in Peter Mandelson’s memoirs were true and even admitted “…The advantage of VAT is it brings in a lot of money. It would have allowed you to have done you know a lot to take down the deficit, but also given you money to spend on things that actually matter, and would have mitigated some … ameliorated some of the worst effects of reductions.”

So Labour’s motion condemning the VAT increases starts to look somewhat shallow when you scrutinise the evidence of their own former Chancellor’s plans.

But then we already know they are in denial and have forgotten Liam Byrne’s now infamous post it note confirming there was no money left!

Maybe in hindsight the Labour group in Knowsley will want to amend their opportunistic motion and include a ban on VAT being applied to Party conference bookings……..or maybe the opposition will table their own amendments on September 8^th – watch this space!