Kemi Badenoch polished her brand as the say-the-unsayable candidate for Conservative leader thus: “Statutory maternity pay is a function of tax; tax comes from people who are working. We’re taking from one group of people and giving to another. This, in my view, is excessive.” She was talking to Times Radio, which maybe she considered a safe space, where disembodied voices could toy with words and not worry too much about what they connoted, somewhere between politics and a dream.
Reality intervened, as people rudely insisted that words did have meaning, actually, and politicians, even those who, God willing, are years from power, still have an impact on people’s lives. In the end, isn’t that what tax is – the distribution of resources from one group to another? Isn’t that what pensions are? Isn’t that what society is? If maternity leave is an excessive redistribution of resource, what is the right amount? None?
