Are you talking about policy or are you talking about what the press want you to think they are talking about?

The problem with both national insurance and vat is that they disproportionately affect the less well off. Hence they are regressive rather than progressive taxes.

Taxing those who are more able to pay are progressive taxes.

Increases in regressive taxes runs completely counter to levelling up

We have been supplied with the old decommissioned pacer trains from southern railways because ours are still in use to be converted into classrooms for northern children to be educated in. I wonder if these are now classed as new schools.

Who's we?

We the people who live north of Watford gap or are you in denial regarding your heritage

Levelling up is/was just another Bojo catch phrase.
The Tory ethos is all about looking after those at the top of the food chain and trying to convince those with some aspiration that they too can join the gang.
Today has seen the manifesto go up in smoke, with NI increased and the Triple Lock on pensions go too.
There will be plenty more to come and the levelling up may be more to do with tax increases than parity with the better off.

All of those small companies who were unable to claim during the pandemic are now to be hit with a further tax on dividends. too.
Many of whom are still trying to recover from having to live on "fresh air" for the last 18 months.

One nation conservatives

And this is just the start of the pay down on the nations debt.

Beranora put owt on me fags, ale, or chicken tikka, or a’ll notbe votin for Im

The next Conservative manifesto will just say “We will say and promise you everything to get elected, whatever you believe so do we, whatever you want we will provide” well right up to the day after the election when it’s back to look after our donors.

So what are you saying ,kids in the north are going to get educated in trains

Isn't that what all the parties say, They all promise you the moon on a stick, till they get elected of course.

No with Boris his form is to try to be friends to everyone then when things go wrong he disappears and sends another minister out to try to bat away questions. The problem this time was he allowed the guarantees to be put in writing in the manifesto which he has spectacularly failed to honour. He can quote the pandemic but he had already got a plan several months before the election ready to go therefore one can only presume he knew it was incorrect what was stated and he was happy to stand on this and many other guarantees that turned out not to be worth the paper they were written on. I suppose like the Brexit deal he signed he could attempt to withdraw the manifesto and ask for it to be written again because he didn’t know what he was agreeing to.
I would ask for balance if this was a Labour government would the Conservatives be standing up saying it not the government’s fault but the pandemic. I suppose he tried to look more PM like by having his hair cut but he couldn’t keep it up and had to open his mouth.

No mention anywhere of the pandemic that has ravished the UK finances from the anti Boris brigade. I'm sure Boris would have loved to have stuck to his manifesto pledges but 'things have changed' in the past 18 months. But you knew that, but found it easier to ignore it just to stick the boot in.

What about his pledge on no new border checks for Northern Ireland, how did that prove to be incorrect and the fault of the pandemic. What about his ready made Brexit deal which he now wants to reject and have another go, how was this the fault of the pandemic.
If he was so certain that the pandemic was handled to the best of his abilities why will he not start an enquiry or even meet the representatives of those that died. It is not possible to give him a kicking because he is never around to be kicked.