In a  move which will deeply embarrass the government, especially Gordon Brown and Alistair Darling, over 12,000 people have signed a Downing Street online petition to demand that the government repeal the recent capital gains tax changes announced in the budget.  Supposedly announced to hit the big money earners in the Private Equity Market, they have effected a vast number of the population and businesses.  Will the petition actually prompt a change?

While it will take a big shift in the position of the government to review the situation, opposition is growing to what now appears to have been a badly thought out plan.  All of the headline winning changes have disappeared, and the bare facts are that if anything the less wealthy of the country are actually worse off.

What next on the fight back agenda?

The next obvious target for attack is the recent rise in fuel duty, which has been magnified after the rise in the price of oil to over $90 a barrel.  Few people realises that the government actually earn a percentage of the price of petrol at the pumps, so a higher oil price hits business and the consumer, but is in effect a stealth tax against the rest of us.

There have been rumours of pickets at the various refineries around the UK, in a throwback to the events of just a couple of years ago, which brought the country to a stand still.  It seems that now more than ever the situation needs to be resolved, and the government will have a growing opposition for some time to come.

Can Gordon Brown afford yet another climb down?