Despite the adoring support from Elon Musk and Donald Trump, Javier Milei’s radical-right free-market nightmare is unravelling, and the people are beginning to score major victories against the government in the streets and in elections, reports BEN HAYES

BUDGETS are accompanied by a blizzard of documentation designed to illuminate the detail of the big fiscal events. But the real effect can be to obscure what the real thrust of policy is and what its impact is.
The confusion surrounding the October 2024 Budget is even greater than usual. Essentially, what is being discussed as a huge tax-and-spend Budget is in reality, a Budget which not only extends austerity but actually deepens it.
First, let us highlight some of the things that have happened (or not) that give the lie to the idea that this is a big tax-and-spend Budget. One striking development is that the IMF has welcomed the Budget. The IMF has never supported what might be called “Keynesian” increases in taxes and public spending; it is an institution gripped by neoliberalism. But it specifically welcomes the central aim to “reduce the deficit by raising revenues.” As we shall see, the burden of that deficit reduction will be taxes on ordinary people.

DIANE ABBOTT MP argues we shouldn’t see last week’s march as an inarticulate outpouring of confused class consciousness, arguing that the agenda was set by the stars of the international far right, whose speeches were explicit, extreme and unopposed

DIANE ABBOTT exposes the misconceptions, rumours and downright lies perpetrated around immigration issues

Every Starmer boast about removing asylum-seekers probably wins Reform another seat while Labour loses more voters to Lib Dems, Greens and nationalists than to the far right — the disaster facing Labour is the leadership’s fault, writes DIANE ABBOTT MP

DIANE ABBOTT explodes the anti-migrant myths perpetrated by cynical politicians and an irresponsible mass media