LABOUR leader Sir Keir Starmer said today that the Budget was the “last desperate act of a party that has failed” showing that the Tories were “completely unable to generate the growth working people need.”
Momentum however warned that “effectively skewering” the government’s failures without offering the popular calls for wealth taxes and investing in public services will backfire on Labour.
Momentum co-chair Kate Dove said Chancellor Jeremy Hunt’s National Insurance cut will benefit the richest but following the Tories’ tightening of non-dom rules, “the gap between the two main parties is smaller than ever.”
She said: “Polling shows voters want taxes on the richest and real investment in our public services.
“By failing to offer it, Labour’s leadership isn’t just letting the public down — they are making a rod for their own back in government.”
Ahead of this year’s general election, the Budget saw Mr Hunt confirm a 2p cut in National Insurance for employees and the self-employed as well as a commitment to scrapping the non-dom status for wealthy foreigners.
Shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves said: “Taxes are still rising, prices are still going up in the shops, and mortgages are higher.
“Nothing Jeremy Hunt has said today changes that.”
Sir Keir told the Commons that the public will judge the cuts on the Tories’ abysmal record in government and that “they recognise a Tory con when they see it” as he called for a general election on May 2.
He said freezing income tax bands will drag more and more people into higher taxes and that “a Tory stealth tax is coming their way in the shape of their next council tax bill.”
Sir Keir added that “most insultingly of all” the Tories’ adoption of Labour’s non-dom tax proposals after years of resistance was an “obvious example of a government that is totally bereft of ideas.”
He said the Budget was the government’s last chance to show it “understands the economic reality of our volatile world” including that a “sticking plaster approach to public investment will cost Britain more in the long-run” and “that trickle-down nonsense means working people pay the price.”
Labour listed 21 times the Tories promised either higher wages, skills or growth in each of its past budget and fiscal statements over the past decade.
A spokesman said: “Despite the promises by successive Tory Chancellors, Britain is worse off — with higher taxes, lower wages and stagnant economic growth.“
