The higher rate of income tax will be pushed up from £50,000 to £80,000, pulling hundreds of thousands of people out of the 40p band entirely. Mr Johnson has said Britain must leave with or without a deal on October 31 and he has said the new income tax threshold will help “stimulate” the economy as the UK leaves the European Union. Writing in The Telegraph he said: “We should be cutting corporation tax and other business taxes.

“We should be raising thresholds of income tax so that we help the huge numbers that have been captured in the higher rate by fiscal drag.

“We can go for much greater economic growth and still be the cleanest, greenest society on earth.”

Other Tory leadership contenders have made ambitious pledges to cut tax.

Jeremy Hunt, the Foreign Secretary, has pledged to use the no deal “fiscal headroom” to slash corporation tax from the current level of 19 percent to just 12.5 percent, the same level as Ireland.

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Dominic Raab, another leadership contender, was the first of to make an ambitious income tax pledge, promising at a Telegraph event to cut the basic rate of income tax from 20p to 15p over five years if he becomes Prime Minister.

It will be funded from the £26.6billion of “fiscal headroom” that is currently set aside by the Treasury for no-deal preparations.

The move, which will cost an estimated £9.6billion a year, will save people thousands of pounds on their tax bill.

The cost of the move will be funded partly by increasing employee national insurance payments in line with the new income tax threshold, and partly by spending money currently reserved for no deal.

Under the plans someone earning £60,000 is estimated to see their tax bill fall by £1,000.

The number of people paying the 40p rate of income tax has risen steadily from 1.7million in 1990 to 4.2million in the current tax year.

Hundreds of thousands of people were dragged into paying the higher rate of after George Osborne, the former Chancellor, repeatedly froze the threshold at which the 40p rate of income tax was paid.

Those who found themselves paying the higher rate included teachers, senior police officers and nurses.

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