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Calls grow for U-turn on ‘inept madness’

Cabinet ministers have privately raised concerns about Kwasi Kwarteng’s £45 billion (NZ$85b) package of tax cuts as calls grow from Tory MPs for the chancellor of the exchequer to reverse course.

One member of Liz Truss’s new Cabinet told The Times that the government had got the timing wrong by announcing such a big package of tax and spending reforms while inflation was so high.

In an echo of the prime minister’s own swipe this summer at President Emmanuel Macron of France, the Cabinet minister said the jury was ‘‘still out’’ on whether Truss could craft a ‘‘strong narrative and vision’’ to sell her measures. The unease emerged after growing numbers of Conservative MPs went public with their concerns that the government was failing to calm the markets.

Julian Smith, who was a Cabinet minister under Theresa May and Boris Johnson, urged Kwarteng to change his plans. ‘‘It is critical that the government is honest about the current situation and plays its part in stabilising markets,’’ he said. ‘‘It can keep a growth plan but needs to make changes. Not doing so will only continue further stress and strain on UK citizens.’’

Simon Hoare, Tory chairman of the Northern Ireland select committee, likened the developments yesterday to Black Wednesday in 1992, when Britain crashed out of the European Exchange Rate Mechanism. He said ‘‘these are not circumstances beyond the control’’ of the Treasury, but ‘‘were authored there’’, adding: ‘‘This inept madness cannot go on’’.

Robert Largan, a member of the 2019 intake of Conservative MPs, said he had ‘‘serious reservations’’ about the plans, especially the abolition of the 45% top rate of tax. In a WhatsApp group for Tory MPs, Paul Holmes, also elected in 2019, asked: ‘‘Where on earth is the PM and chancellor to reassure people?’’ Steve Brine, a former minister, replied that they had gone ‘‘totally awol’’.

Instead it was Andrew Griffith, a junior Treasury minister, who was sent out to defend the government in the media. He refused to accept that the fall in the value of the pound and the rising cost of government borrowing showed that investors had lost confidence in ministers’ handling of the economy.

Griffith said that ‘‘every major economy’’ was ‘‘dealing with exactly these issues’’, and that the tax cuts made the UK’s economy competitive.

World

en-nz

2022-09-30T07:00:00.0000000Z

2022-09-30T07:00:00.0000000Z

https://fairfaxmedia.pressreader.com/article/282497187542629

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