EVERYTHING is going fine, complacent Chancellor Rachel Reeves told broken and beleaguered Britain today even as the jobs crisis deepened.

Ms Reeves used her Spring Statement to signal no policy modifications, claiming instead that “this government has the right economic plan for our country.”

She made the claim as the Office of Budget Responsibility (OBR) revealed that the unemployment rate was set to soar this year from 4.75 per cent to 5.3 per cent, with young workers likely to be hardest hit.

The office said: “Labour market weakness still appears to be driven primarily by entrants into the labour force struggling to find work amid subdued hiring demand.”

Yet no new policies were announced by Ms Reeves, who instead used the set-piece occasion to trumpet the government’s purported achievements.

She claimed that debt was set to fall while productivity was to rise over the course of the parliament.

Ms Reeves ruled out any change to her stringent fiscal rules and also appeared to back her catastrophically unpopular boss in Number 10, telling MPs: “We must reject the temptation of easy answers and reckless borrowing to protect family finances and get the cost of living down, and we must reject the political instability which would put at risk all the progress that we have made.”

However, her do-nothing strategy was immediately slammed by University and College Union general secretary Jo Grady, who said: “Rachel Reeves and Keir Starmer have betrayed the millions of graduates drowning in debt by refusing to lift a finger to help them.”

National Education Union general secretary Daniel Kebede said: “School budgets are running on empty and further cuts will lead to fewer staff, larger classes and more work for teachers. The Chancellor today has offered no solutions to these problems.”

And Fire Brigades Union general secretary Steve Wright slammed the failure to announce a wealth tax or raise the minimum wage, calling the statement “a wasted opportunity to change direction ahead of May’s elections.”

“It’s now that much more likely that Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves will be ousted from Downing Street soon after,” he warned.

Ms Reeves’s plan for the future turned on “breaking down trade barriers,” including moving closer to the European Union and “harnessing the power of AI,” she announced.

The OBR downgraded anticipated growth for the next year from 1.4 per cent to 1.1 per cent.

None of this properly accounts for the impact of the war in the Middle East, which was sending both oil prices and borrowing costs soaring today. 

Transport union TSSA general secretary Maryam Eslamdoust pointed out: “The current energy price cap won’t be enough to offset rising bills linked to instability in the Middle East, which is driving up energy costs and disrupting supply chains.”

TUC general secretary Paul Nowak said ministers might need to step in should the war lead to price surges.

He welcomed the government’s overall approach and its plan to move closer to the EU, but said reversing Tory austerity should mean questioning the role of unelected institutions like the OBR itself.

“A clear framework for fiscal policy is necessary – but it is time the rein in the outsized power the unaccountable OBR has across government policy,” he said.

“That means an urgent review of the OBR to ensure it is fit for purpose in the modern economy.”