One of Reform’s top bosses refused to hold back when hurling criticism at the Chancellor over her Budget “lies”.
Sitting down with Dawn Neesom, Reform’s policy frontman Zia Yusuf accused Rachel Reeves of “lying her whole career”, from the very beginnings of her career all the way to the doorstep of No11.
“She lied. She lied! And there’s some sort of perceived wisdom in politics that you shouldn’t accuse somebody – I’m sorry. A lie is a lie.
“And she’s lied repeatedly. Her career actually has been built on a lie, I’m afraid. She lied on her CV to get selected and then become an MP.
“She lied when she talked about how much borrowing and spending she was going to do in order to win the election, then she lied about whether she was going to raise taxes or not.
“Now she’s raised taxes again, and the evidence that she has lied about this black hole and the country’s financial position when she gave that extraordinary speech, which, if you remember, everybody’s jaws were on the floor when she gave that speech because no one could understand what was going on.
“The evidence that she lied is now in the public domain. The IFS (Institute for Fiscal Studies) basically called her a liar.
“Didn’t quite use the word ‘liar’, but the most the strongest-worded communication I have seen from the IFS in my lifetime.”
Zia Yusuf hurled criticism at the Chancellor
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GB NEWS
Forecasting the future for Ms Reeves, he added: “I can’t see how she’s going to get away with this.
“And if she gets away with this, I’m afraid we are plumbing new depths in British politics.”
Hours after Mr Yusuf appeared on GB News, Reform leader Nigel Farage announced that he had written to Sir Laurie Magnus, the Prime Minister’s independent ethics adviser, to request an investigation into Ms Reeves over whether she broke the ministerial code.
Ms Reeves has had her feet put to the fire since ahead of the Budget when she was believed to be preparing the ground – and British people – for tax hikes, despite Labour vowing to not raise key taxes on “working people” in the lead-up to the General Election last year.
RACHEL REEVES’ BUDGET – READ MORE:
James Murray defended the Chancellor on GB News
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GB NEWS
The Chancellor had repeatedly warned the public”tough decisions” would have to be made at her second Budget due to an eye-watering £30billion gap in the Treasury.
As a result, Britons began to fear that the Chancellor would increase taxes on Britons to plug the crippling gap in the public purse.
Then, on Budget day, Ms Reeves announced she would clobber Britons with a slew of tax hikes – amounting to £26billion – she claimed were necessary, given the state of the economy.
But on Friday the Office for Budget Responsibility revealed that Ms Reeves had been informed on September 17 the so-called “black hole” was much smaller than initial warnings.
What’s more, it has also come to light Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer was also aware there was no “black hole” in the British public purse, yet went on to sign off a speech where Ms Reeves is believed to have misled Britons.
In the speech, which Downing Street confirmed Sir Keir was happy with, Ms Reeves warned poor productivity would have “consequences for the public finances” while families would need to “do their bit” to plug the gap.
But a few days earlier, the Office for Budget Responsibility had told her the black hole had disappeared – and had, in fact, been replaced by £4.2billion to spare.
Earlier today, Ms Reeves’ second-in-command James Murray told GB News that his boss had not lied to the public, following No10’s dismissal that the Chancellor misled the public.
“Going into the Budget process, we also knew we wanted to get headroom up, and that headroom is critical to helping to get the cost of Government borrowing and to getting mortgages down,” he said.
“So we went into the Budget with those priorities, and the Chancellor set them out.
“She set out in her speech in early November that we needed more headroom, that everyone was going to be asked to make a contribution, and that our priorities in the Budget would be to cut the cost of living, cut NHS waiting lists, and cut that Government borrowing.”