WATCH: Further income tax hikes 'not beyond the realms of possibility', Rowley tells GB News

Can we have a word about the Chancellor of the Exchequer

Because the budget is hurtling in our direction in not that many weeks

And we're looking at a repeat of last year's once-in-a-generation tax-raising budget, aren't we

Exactly. And look, if this China story wasn't so dominating, it's been over a week now

it's coming up to seven or eight days over the front pages, Then this story would have grabbed all of the headlines because the Chancellor slipped out on a trip, I think, to Washington, that she was going to make the numbers add up

And that was either through tax rises and some spending cuts. But you're right. The last budget last year, she said she wasn't going to come back and ask for more taxes

And now, fast forward 12 months, she's coming back to ask for more taxes, potentially

Why? Because growth has been downgraded. People have left who could be wealth creators and generators that, you know, the government couldn't get its own welfare reforms through that would have saved them five billion when she wanted to try and save a few pennies only a couple of months ago

You know, and the audacity that we read in the papers is that, you know, they're going to try and pin all of this on Nigel Farage and voting for Brexit

Well we had Covid since then The global economy was shut down you got to pick your lane You can the one hand try and talk up the economy and say well we the second fastest growing in the G7

On the one hand, and that we're doing trade deals with India and with the US and how great that is

which things that we wouldn't be able to do outside of the EU, all the while saying, oh, it's your terrible boy who's back home

And, oh, it's all Nigel's fault and anyone that voted Brexit, you're to blame. I mean, the government haven't got, again, a clear position on what it is that they're trying to articulate

But also, I think this will go down, without newsflash, very, very badly

Because people are feeling the pinch enough. You know, inflation is high. Energy bills are up

There is no growth in the economy. Taxes are up. You know, on working people, something that they said they weren't going to do

And it seems to me, as a lot of economists are saying, that she's going to have to

the Chancellor, row back on one of her election pledges, which is not to raise national insurance, VAT or income tax

She's already raised national insurance contributions, but we were told to read the small print

Yeah, from employers. Exactly. But, you know, as a headline announcement, people will feel short-changed by that

Is she now going to raise income tax? Let's wait and see. It's not beyond the realms of possibility

because she's put herself into a corner. There isn't that fiscal headroom. The money needs to come from somewhere

and, you know, not long to find out. Yeah