Rubbish Check
Daily Mail Money · 15 October 2026
source“Britain is raising taxes at fastest rate in G7, says IMF – as Healey prepares further hikes after ruling out more borrowing to fund Budget giveaways”
R3/ 10
Lightly altered
Rubbish Rating — 1 = base fact, 10 = pure rubbish
12345678910
In short
Rubbish Talk rates the Daily Mail's claim that Britain is raising taxes fastest in the G7 a 3/10 because the IMF figures are accurate and corroborated elsewhere, but the headline presents an anonymously-sourced Budget leak about Healey as settled fact and skips the caveat that the IMF's measure is broader government revenue, not tax alone.
The Verdict
Lightly altered. The core IMF statistic checks out cleanly against independent reporting of the same data, but the headline bolts on a second claim, that Healey has definitively ruled out more borrowing, sourced only to unnamed Budget insiders via the FT, and omits that the IMF's "tax burden" figure also counts public corporation and state-asset income.
What actually happened
The IMF's fiscal projections show UK government revenue rising to 41.9% of GDP by the start of the next parliament, the steepest increase among G7 economies. Separately, the Financial Times reported that Chancellor Healey has told Budget insiders he will not fund new spending through extra borrowing, implying tax rises or cuts will cover any giveaways on 28 October.
Key facts
- IMF projects UK revenue-to-GDP rising to 41.9%, up from 38.2% at the start of 2025, the largest increase in the G7.
- Only France is expected to join Britain in raising its tax burden within the G7, while the US, Germany, Portugal and Greece are all forecast to cut theirs.
- The IMF measure is a broad one: it includes income from public corporations and state-owned assets as well as tax receipts, not pure taxation.
- The "no further borrowing" claim traces to unnamed sources briefing the FT, not an official Treasury statement, ahead of Healey's 28 October Budget.
What to watch for
Watch whether Healey's Budget is genuinely "scorecard positive" as briefed, or whether borrowing headroom quietly moves. Also watch if coverage keeps conflating "tax burden" with the broader revenue measure, since banks, betting and online retail levies floated by analysts would only partly explain a jump of this scale.
About this scoreThe R-Score is Rubbish Talk's editorial opinion on how far a headline's framing sits from what the underlying facts support. It is a judgement about presentation and emphasis, not an allegation that any outlet has acted dishonestly. Every figure we rely on is linked under Receipts so you can check it yourself.
