No. This isn’t something to be proud of.
I wasn’t paid as a Minister - there’s a limit of 83 paid ministers, and I could afford it. But most people can’t, and we don’t want to go back to a politics which is only open to the wealthy.
MPs should actually be paid *more*, not less.
So this so-called ‘government of growth’ is scrapping plans to build the country’s fastest ever computer, cutting infrastructure projects throughout the country, reducing housebuilding in London and will soon be announcing tax rises. Very slow hand clap please.
The Bank of England has just cut interest rates for the first time since 2020.
This is welcome news for millions of homeowners and shows the Labour Government inherited a much stronger economy than they're letting on.
Extraordinary admissions from BMA junior doctors committee co-chair:
🔴 Confirmed strikes over last two years were linked to the general election.
🔴 Don’t regard huge 22% rise offered by Labour enough.
🔴 Plan to strike again in 12 months for more.
Labour have decided to cut the London housing target by 20%.
This is a deliberate attempt to build in Conservative seats rather than where homes are needed most. Labour are putting party before country.
It's a grubby thing to do.
A lot of serious, cross-party work went into finding a sensible way forward and this slash and tax Chancellor has put all of that in the bin in the name of political expediency
I am heartbroken that Rachel Reeves has chosen to abandon the cap on social care costs.
After years of political disagreement about social care, we had at last achieved a consensus - this was in the Labour and Conservative manifestos.
This is a monumental betrayal.
For 2.5 years Labour have accused the Conservatives of making people choose between eating and heating.
One of Labour’s first acts in Government is to cancel winter fuel payments for pensioners.
Labour has caved in to union demands and rewarded strike action at huge cost to the taxpayer.
Labour is cancelling hospitals and roads and scrapping winter fuel payments for vulnerable pensioners to pay for it. This is their choice.
Rachel Reeves’s £22 billion fiscal “black hole”, which most folk knew about bar, strangely, her is almost 50% the result of the Chancellor agreeing to large public-sector pay rises, without any increased productivity conditions, which makes her ignorance of the the black hole
Following statements made in the House, I have written to the Cabinet Secretary on the concerning contradiction between the Main Estimates put before Parliament last week and the document presented by the Chancellor today.
The Chancellor has shown today that she will put the Labour Party before country. Caving into her union paymasters and attacking pensioners to pay for it.
(1/13) We strongly oppose the means-testing of Winter Fuel Payment (WFP) because our initial estimate is that as many as two million pensioners who badly need the money to stay warm this winter will not receive it. Read our full statement:
If you're a pensioner on anything over around £10,000...Labour have just cut your winter fuel allowance.
Tax increases coming flying down the tracks. Major rail upgrades cancelled.
But inflation busting pay increases (22% for Junior Doctors)...all signed off. Welcome to Labour.
The absolute bare cheek of Reeves to complain about Covid contract corruption when she sent this list of Del Boy suppliers to buy PPE from in April 2020.
Over 50 times in the election Labour told the public they had no plans to raise taxes.
Now they’re laying the ground to break their word.
Raising taxes will be the ultimate betrayal of working people and the mandate Labour were elected on. The British people will not forget it.
In seven years I have never heard such a dishonest, brazen and arrogant statement as the one I am hearing right now from our new axe and tax Chancellor.
They always planned to do this. It’s crystal clear now that Labour knew exactly what they wanted to do, but they refused to set out their plans at the election. I said as much here 👇🏻 during the campaign. It was all so predictable
Rachel’s guide to growing your own £20 bn hole:
1️⃣ Do look at just one side of the budget: ignore departmental underspends but be sure to big up the risk of overspends.
2️⃣ Ignore the benefit of an improving economy with the interest rate government pays on borrowing expected to
Spot on
@DanielJHannan
: “The claim that Labour is inheriting a uniquely poor situation is palpable piffle. We don’t have to reach back to Wilson’s devaluation or Healey’s IMF bailout. We need only recall the situation that the last Labour government bequeathed 14 years ago. 1/2