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DERMOT MURNAGHAN: Now then, the Liberal Democrats are committed to keeping the 50p rate of tax for the time being, at least that’s if you listen to their leader Nick Clegg but the Liberal Democrat MP and Foreign Office Minister, Jeremy Browne, perhaps sees things differently. This week he said the government should make personal taxes lower than the competition if Britain is to remain competitive. Well Mr Browne joins me now, a very good morning to you. Just let me clear up your thinking on the 50p tax rate, it is much discussed at the moment after all those business leaders wrote to the Telegraph asking for its removal. Do you agree with them, do you think it should go, that it is affecting Britain’s competitiveness?

JEREMY BROWNE: I’m not at odds with Nick Clegg and I’m not at odds with the rest of the government either. The government, both the Conservative and Liberal Democrat parts of the government, are very clear that our main priority on tax is to raise the starting threshold so we at the moment have got round to about £8000, we are going to lift the threshold over the course of this parliament up to £10,000 so that people pay no income tax at all on the first £10,000 that they earn.

DERMOT MURNAGHAN: And you would like to get there as quickly as possible, before the end of the parliament?

JEREMY BROWNE: Well I hope we can get there as quickly as possible because it is very good for people on low and middle incomes, they get to keep more of their money, they become more self-reliant, less dependent on the state, I think all of that is good and it doesn’t just benefit people at the lowest end of the scale who get lifted out of tax altogether, it benefits millions and millions of people. Most people who are watching this show will get an income tax cut now as a result of this policy. It is very progressive and a very good policy.

DERMOT MURNAGHAN: 50p, does it damage the economy?

JEREMY BROWNE: Well we are going to see the evidence of the report that the Treasury provides. The question I was asked on Thursday and the question I tried to give a straight answer to is that I think all countries do need to have competitive tax systems, they do need to make sure that they are not vastly out of line with other countries. Now I don't think that we are vastly out of line but I think that we need to see whether we’re getting the mix right, that’s what the Treasury is looking at at the moment. I don't think there are any immediate proposals to get rid of the 50p rate because the £10,000 at the bottom end of the scale is, as I’ve said, the priority for the get but neither the Conservatives nor the Liberal Democrats are intellectually wedded to a 50p rate, neither of us had it in our manifestos, neither party says that it is a permanent measure so as and when it becomes possible, and this is what the Chancellor will decide and not me, but as and when it becomes possible to look at what we do on tax rates then changes may be made, but that’s not the priority at the moment.

DERMOT MURNAGHAN: We’re hearing much discussed before the Budget that aspiration of moving the burden of taxation away from income, let people keep more of that and tax wealth instead and that’s where the Lib Dems mansion tax comes in. If there could be something done there as a quid pro quo I suppose, would you like to see the 50p rate go more quickly?

JEREMY BROWNE: Well that’s not a matter for me, that’s a matter for the Chancellor. There is a wider debate because obviously we have got many different sources of tax revenue, whether it’s VAT on consumption and then we have income tax on income and work for example, and there is a legitimate debate about where we put the burden of taxation and should we lighten the burden as we are at the lower and middle end of the scale for people working, because we want to reward work, we want to promote people doing more work and should we therefore shift some of that burden on to non-working areas of the economy? I think that is a reasonable intellectual debate to be had but I’ll come back to it, the number one tax priority of the government is to help people on low and middle incomes by lifting the threshold up towards £10,000.

DERMOT MURNAGHAN: Okay and you are of course Foreign Office Minister and we want to discuss foreign affairs with you, first of all this news that has come in from Libya, in Benghazi, of British war graves being desecrated. This wasn’t what we imagined, was it, when we went to help out the Libyan opposition last year?

JEREMY BROWNE: No, it’s an absolutely appalling story and people will be shocked by the photos in the Sunday newspapers. My grandfather’s generation were truly heroic in that part of Africa in the Second World War and I think people will be shocked by what they see but it’s worth saying, and I think it’s important to say this, that the Libyan authorities themselves are shocked too. We have had direct dealings with them, they have been extremely apologetic and they have made a very strong commitment that they will get to the bottom of what is happening, they will try and do everything they can to resolve it and …

DERMOT MURNAGHAN: Will they repair the damage?

JEREMY BROWNE: My understanding is that it is not just British graves or just Christian graves hat are being desecrated, there is wider desecration taking place, but the Libyan authorities as I say are keen to work with us on this and are extremely apologetic so I wouldn’t want people to think that this is somehow a demonstration of ingratitude by the government of Libya, that is not the case.

DERMOT MURNAGHAN: Okay, with Libya in mind, we remember the Prime Minister talking last year about intervention in Libya, saying just because we can’t do everything doesn’t mean to say we shouldn’t do something. Does the reverse now apply to what’s going on in Syria and people seeing those appalling pictures, those scenes coming out of Homs and in particular Baba Amr, we can’t do anything about it? Is that the case?

JEREMY BROWNE: Well this is a huge preoccupation of the government and we are working very hard. We have co-ordinated positions with the European Union on sanctions, the Foreign Secretary is in Brussels negotiating those this week and we have common positions to try and push forward at the United Nations, I was this week working with the United Nations Human Rights Council on trying to take forward the position on Syria, we are trying to do more on getting access with humanitarian aid. We are very supportive of Kofi Annan, the new UN special envoy on Syria. We are very, very clear that the people responsible for these atrocities in Syria will be held to account, we are not going to wipe the slate clean afterwards and pretend that nothing ever happened but …

DERMOT MURNAGHAN: But in Libya people remember that we put the RAF in there and blew the tyrants away.

JEREMY BROWNE: Yes but Libya and Syria are in a different position. People have said over many years they want us to do it by the book. We are very supportive of the Arab League but we need to work within the United Nations and as you know, Russia and China are blocking the progress we would like to see in the United Nations. Now I think that is a big issue for Russia and China, I think they are putting themselves on the wrong side of history and I think they are making a mistake not just in humanitarian terms but in their own narrow political self-interested terms because they will find that the people of the Middle East are in one place, wanting more freedom, more choice in their lives and Russia and China are seen as a barrier to the people in the Middle East making the type of progress that they want to make. So I think Russia and China are making a mistake but they are UN Security Council permanent members, we have to work with the situation as it is but we are extremely active and we are doing everything that we can in our power to work with people right across the board to try and make sure that we can make progress and resolve the terrible situation in Libya, in Syria sorry.

DERMOT MURNAGHAN: In Syria, yes, well we understand that. Mr Browne, thank you very much indeed. Jeremy Browne there, Foreign Office Minister, on that appalling situation in Syria.