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A new study by the British charity CARE has found that married couples with children are paying a third more in tax than similar families in other developed countries. The charity said the report highlighted what it called a “socially destructive inequality in the UK tax system”.

Among the report’s findings were that married couples with children and one earner bringing in up to £33,000 a year pay 18 per cent more tax in the UK than in other EU countries.

And the proportion of income taken in tax from middle income families has more than doubled in 40 years, despite having stayed the same for single people.

CARE’s Director of Parliamentary Affairs, Dan Boucher, said: “The failure of the UK tax system to recognise family responsibilities makes it one of the most individualistic tax systems in the world.

“It is imperative that the next Government addresses the current anomaly so that single-earner married couples on average incomes with children are not penalised as at present.”

There has been fierce political debate recently in Britain over recognising marriage in the tax system. In Ireland, tax individualization now penalizes families by up to €7000 every year.