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Ed Balls: "This is not an anti-business agenda ... it's an anti business as usual agenda"
Ed Balls has rejected claims that Labour's pledge to bring back the 50p top rate of income tax is part of an "anti-business agenda" in the party.
The shadow chancellor said it was a "fair" measure to be used while Labour reduced the "huge" deficit it would inherit if it won the 2015 election.
While those earning more than £150,000 should pay more, he told the BBC he wanted to see overall taxes falling.
Foreign Secretary William Hague said it sent "the wrong signal" about Britain.
And some business leaders have echoed that warning.
End Quote William Hague Foreign SecretaryEd Balls is sending the signal that a future Labour government will go back to high taxing, high spending and high borrowing"
The previous Labour government created a new 50% tax band in 2010 for anyone with income of more than £150,000, but the coalition cut it to 45% last April.
Mr Balls told the BBC's Andrew Marr show that this had been "foolish" and had "fed resentment" at a time of deep austerity.
"I don't think it is justified - when people have seen their taxes go up and most people have seen their living standards fall - cutting income tax for the highest earners, which is what George Osborne and [Prime Minister] David Cameron have done," he said.
Mr Balls suggested the 50p rate would only be in place while Labour cleared the budget deficit, which it aims to do by 2020. He also ruled out raising it further.
"What we are talking about is going to 50p while we get the deficit down," he said.
"It is a fair way to get the deficit down. The phrase is 'we are all in it together' - that is part of the policy."
Critics of Labour have claimed the move is part of a growing pattern of anti-business rhetoric, following Ed Miliband's pledge to freeze energy prices for 20 months and to set a limit on the size of high street banks.
Mr Balls said he was "pro-business" and had a track record of supporting an "open, dynamic, wealth-creating, entrepreneurial economy".
But he said Labour would take a different approach to reforming the big banking and energy markets than the coalition, and ensure an "investment-led recovery".
"This is not an anti-business agenda, it is an anti-business as usual agenda."
He added: "It is absolutely not back to the 1980s and 1990s. The reality is we are in very difficult circumstances and because of George Osborne's failure in the last few years these difficult circumstances will last well until into the next Parliament."
He also said there was a strong economic case for reinstating the 50p top rate, claiming it had raised £10bn more than was anticipated for the three years it was in place and would raise "substantial" sums again.
Ministers have disputed this, saying their decision to cut the top tax rate to 45p had reduced Treasury income by about £100m a year.
Speaking on the same programme, Mr Hague said raising income tax was the wrong message to give when the UK was seeing its economic fortunes improve, with growth increasing and both inflation and unemployment falling.
"The long-term economic plan of this government is working.
"Ed Balls is sending the signal that if there is a Labour government we will go back to high taxing, high spending and high borrowing... That is an anti-business, anti-job creation agenda."
'Predatory taxation'Business have roundly criticised Labour's plans, with one employers' group calling the move an "envy-driven political gesture".
Stuart Rose, the former boss of Marks and Spencer, said higher taxes were a disincentive to investment and a 50p rate "bordered on predatory taxation".
"We have just been through the toughest recession that any of us have seen in living memory," he said. "We're just coming out at the other side of it and I think it would be very silly to do something that would jeopardise that recovery.
"And certainly I can see a very real and present danger in doing so."
In his speech on Saturday, Mr Balls also announced a Labour government would balance the books and deliver a budget surplus as well as passing a law to ensure it adheres to "tough" and binding fiscal rules.
This would mean eliminating the deficit and cutting debt as a share of GDP between 2015 and 2020.
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