And the spin goes on and on - IHT

Gordon Brown Alistair Darling has just decided to try to deceive the public by implying that the death tax threshold will go up to £600k - for couples. ( You see the last words - he's hoping you won't think long on those. Its all designed for that headline - government policy is determined solely for the personal benefit of Gordon Brown's ambition. ).

Now most switched on people will already have wills that set up trusts to take advantage of each persons IHT allowance in a couple. Some won't and now they won't need to - which is to be welcomed.

But why should couples be more deserving than single people ? Or the pair of old aunts ? Is Labour trying to promote marriage ?

Does anyone think its be forensically analysed by Gordon Brown and not thought up as a panic measure. Cameron is right - Broon thinks we are all fools.

What Brown doesn't understand is that each time he tries to deceive and trick people they become less willing to listen or believe him on anything.

It turns out that Brown was all along the real New Labour prince of darkness.

Update:

Blogger reactions:
Iain Dale - remembers what Gordon Brown used to say ( when it suited his ambition ).
Conservative home is working the details out through its comments here, and also has George Osborne's response in summary.
Watch the Labour home hive mind adjust to the new truth that want to reduce death tax also on this comment thread here - its fun to watch them trade in their supposed principles in for poll ratings ....credit to NorthernMonkey who says the following:

Well it was to be expected wasn't it - Darling has basically copied the Tories idea of cutting IHT. As a supporter of IHT, this is a disappointment to me but at least it's not as high as £1million which the Tories are proposing.

Dizzy wonders if perhaps the £600k will cover most of the house prices in the marginal seats.
Cllr Tony Sharp thinks "Plagiarism and opportunism denotes Labour" over at the Waendel Journal - and I thought I was a cynic ! In fact he's being more prophetic as I don't think he's directly commenting on this afternoon's spin - yet.
Guido wonders - given all Alistair Darlings hysterics about the Conservative proposals how many schools and hospitals he will need to close for Alistair's own Tory-Lite proposals.
John's Labour party blog at least has principles and is willing to object to a move that sits very oddly with former Labour party policy.
John Redwood is, by contrast, welcoming some of the changes !

Further: What's the implication of backdating this measure ? Or is really only applying to estates seeking probate after the announcement. ( There will be a lot of people who settled probate today who did very badly out of this ).