‘Dishy’ Rishi is no more
The chancellor’s spring statement has come in for criticism
This briefing will help in answering a political parties question
I have argued previously, that this Conservative government has had to depart from Tory orthodox on the economy, dispensing with Thatcherism’s low tax and low spend fiscal conservatism. Instead it has spent unprecedented sums and intervened in the economy at levels and intensity you would expect from any Labour government.
This week the chancellor Rishi Sunak stood up in parliament to deliver his ‘mini-budget’. The spring statement followed weeks of Tory backbench lobbying to do more to deal with the cost of living crisis. Energy prices and inflation (yearly rises in the price of goods - now coming up to 7%) has meant that incomes have been squeezed.
However his statement did not meet expectations, here’s a summary:
Fuel duty (VAT on fuel) would be lowered by 5p a litre. On average car owners filling up their tanks will save around £3.
He would remove VAT on solar panels and other green additions to houses
He did not budge on his planned rise to National insurance of 1.25% (this was the issue many Tory backbenchers were agitating against)
But he has raised the personal income-tax threshold (the amount where you would not be liable to pay any tax on earnings) to £12 570.
He has promised to cut income tax in 2024 (a promise he cannot really make at this stage because there is a possibility a recession is on its way)
All in all it looks like thin gruel. And it was a PR disaster. Sunak looked uneasy on TV when his budget unraveled. It reminds me of the government’s budget in early 2020 when they were still denying the impact of covid - that had to be completely rewritten when the March lockdown was announced in the same year.
The richest man in the cabinet in action:
The energy crisis is likely to last a long time. After the Covid bailouts, people expect the new un-ideological state to step in. Rishi is a Thatcherite by impulse (he had Thatcher’s poster up in his room at university - I know weird.) Yet this chancellor has learnt the hard way, that his once enviable status as the likeable Tory was largely down to his unlimited reserve of handouts.
Like many senior Tories, Sunak has an eye on the top job when the inevitable decline of Johnson happens. Yet this budget will do little to help brand Sunak. Sadly modern politics is less about public service and more about hollow positioning to win positions.