| Keir Starmer has sparked a bit of a row after saying that people who get income from shares or property don't count as "working people" during an interview with Sky News in Samoa, where he's attending the Commonwealth heads of government meeting. You wouldn't know it from the fierce debate that has ensued, but the comments don't really tell us anything new: It was already widely expected that the government would increase capital gains tax on the sale of shares in next week's budget. The rest is semantics. A Downing Street spokesperson has since clarified that a person who holds a small amount of savings in stocks and shares still counts as a working person. He said that the premier was referring to people who primarily receive income from investments.  Keir Starmer at the CHOGM welcome state banquet in Samoa. Photographer: Fiona Goodall/Getty Images AsiaPac With Starmer in Samoa and Rachel Reeves in Washington DC, the rest of the government is quietly getting ready/bracing (delete as appropriate) for next week's budget. And what everyone is talking about is not what's in it, but what's not in it. It hasn't been an easy start for the Labour government. Step back from the dramas in recent months surrounding Sue Gray, freebies or debates over "working people," and many involved say that the single defining move of their period in office to date has been means-testing winter fuel subsidies for pensioners — and not in a positive way. That was where the trouble started, they say, making the freebie stories politically toxic and precipitating the plunge in Labour's poll ratings. Gordon Brown's first move as Chancellor was to make the Bank of England independent; for Rachel Reeves, it was scrapping help for pensioners with their heating bills. After some tricky weeks and a quashed government rebellion on the issue, the furore has mostly died down. But for many in government the fear is that the issue will return with a vengeance as the thermometer starts to drop. They fret that stories about older people suffering, or even dying, this winter will come back to bite the government, whether there is a direct link with winter fuel subsidies or not. Given that fear, an expectation has been building among MPs that the budget might offer something to soften the blow. They're especially concerned about those on the "cliff edge" — the people who will narrowly miss out on the payment now that it is means-tested — with speculation that the government could increase the threshold, or offer that group a different benefit. But I've heard from multiple sources that isn't the case — there will be no significant measure to soften the blow to pensioners, unless the Treasury is holding its cards very tightly to its chest. Instead, I'm told there will likely be longer-term measures around home insulation and tackling poverty, but nothing that will specifically mitigate the impact of this cut this winter. Is that the right decision? Plenty of people in the Treasury and Number 10 are exuding confidence — that the cut was necessary in August, that they didn't have a better alternative, that it never made sense to have a payment even pensioners as rich as the King would be able to claim, and that they have now settled the argument. Others in government aren't so sure. Want this in your inbox each weekday? You can sign up here. | 
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