The Chancellor is not a woman of her word. Quite the reverse.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves says things she cannot possibly mean (Image: Getty)
During the general election, she pledged that Labour would be “the most pro-business government the country has ever seen”. Then in her Budget, she hit businesses with a £25billion jobs tax that’s already driven thousands to the wall and destroyed 234,000 jobs and counting. She also slapped inheritance tax on family firms, which will destroy many more. Entrepreneurs are fleeing in droves.
Last November, she assured us she wasn’t coming back for more tax hikes. On Wednesday, she’s hit us for up to £35billion. She says one thing and does the opposite, again and again. Every time she declares she has “fixed the foundations” of the economy, I want to scream.
Growth has flatlined. Unemployment soared. Food prices have rocketed, along with the debt and deficit. The Chancellor has fixed the economy in the same way an old-school gangland boss would “fix you” if you scraped his Daimler.
Literally zero percent of the population says the economy is in a very good state. That still doesn’t stop Reeves parroting her false mantra.
Yesterday, she tossed out yet more hostages to fortune by claiming rising public debt “is not a Labour virtue”. Right now, it feels like the only one.
The Chancellor borrowed £17.4billion in October alone, and £116.8billion in total since April. That’s £10billion more than forecast. Talk is one thing, action another.
Reeves also boasted she would grip inflation and sort the cost-of-living crisis. Yet she’s the one who fanned the flames just as inflation was fading. Her jobs tax pushed prices higher as firms passed on the cost. Inflation-busting public sector pay awards and the minimum wage hike did the rest.
Reeves must think we’re fools, because yesterday she came out with yet another pledge that has no grounding in reality.
She said controlling public spending “will require us to reform our welfare system too”. That’s true. Controlling spending absolutely demands reform of our broken benefits system and culture.
There’s just one problem. Reeves isn’t going to do anything about it. Not in this Budget, and not afterwards if Labour’s back benchers have their way.
In her defence, she did try last year. Alongside work and pensions secretary Liz Kendall, she drew up reforms worth £5billion in savings. That’s a tiny dent in a welfare bill heading for £100billion a year, but better than nothing.
Unfortunately, nothing is what we got. More than 100 Labour MPs threatened to vote against the plan, forcing Keir Starmer into yet another humiliating U-turn.
I have sympathy for Reeves here. She tried. Starmer wilted. It was the second time he’d failed to back her, after reversing her winter fuel payment cut.
Reeves likes to style herself the “Iron Chancellor” but she hasn’t a chance with a PM made of wet cardboard. That doesn’t stop her pretending.
She won’t do a thing to reform welfare on Wednesday. Instead, she’ll blow an extra £15billion on benefits, including scrapping the two-child cap.
Her words mean nothing, and words are all we’ll get on Wednesday. The bill will follow.
This will blow up in her face, confirming her habit of simply making stuff up, but it’s taxpayers who’ll ultimately pay the price.
