Latest news with #Downing Street
Telegraph
3 days ago
- Politics
- Telegraph
Suspended Labour MP: It's insulting and contemptuous to call me a k---head
A suspended Labour MP has said it is 'insulting' to be accused of 'k---headery'. Rachael Maskell was one of four Labour MPs stripped of the party whip on Wednesday as Sir Keir Starmer punished rebels who voted against his flagship welfare reforms. A Government source told The Times some MPs would be suspended for 'persistent k---headery' and rebelling against Downing Street. But Ms Maskell told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme: 'I don't even know what that means but I think it is really insulting. 'I am here trying to do a professional job on behalf of people that desperately need a voice. 'And if that is the contempt by which I and my colleagues are treated, let alone my constituents, I find that really insulting and I hope that is withdrawn.' The disciplinary move by the Prime Minister means the four MPs will now sit in the House of Commons as independents, raising questions about their long-term futures. Jeremy Corbyn, the former Labour leader, is in the process of setting up a new Left-wing party which he says will provide a 'real alternative'. But Ms Maskell, who served on Mr Corbyn's front bench as shadow environment secretary in 2016-7, categorically ruled out joining the new party as she declared she was 'Labour through and through'. Asked whether she would consider the move, she replied: 'No, no, no. I am Labour through and through. I support the Labour Party. I have been a member for so long, walked the streets, knocked the doors all those years and of course I want to see a Labour Government really succeed. 'I really hope from this process, yes there will be reflection over the summer, but also learning. 'And there needs to be a better reach out to backbenchers to ensure that we are the safeguards of the Government, ensuring that the Government do well.' Ms Maskell was one of the most prominent critics of Sir Keir's original welfare reforms and tabled an amendment which would have killed the legislation. A Labour revolt over the welfare bill extended to 127 MPs at one point, forcing the Government to cave in on its planned cuts to disability benefits, wiping away all of the planned £4.6bn of savings. Ms Maskell rejected the suggestion that she had been a 'ringleader' of the rebellion. But he signalled she does not intend to change her behaviour in terms of speaking out against the Government. The York Central MP said it was 'not about my behaviour'. Told that Sir Keir's decision to withdraw the whip was precisely because of her behaviour and asked again if she intended to change her approach, she replied: 'I will continue to advocate for my constituents, of course.' The other three MPs who lost the whip were Neil Duncan-Jordan, Chris Hinchliff and Brian Leishman. A further three welfare rebels – Dr Rosena Allin-Khan, Bell Ribeiro-Addy and Mohammad Yasin – were also punished as they lost their trade envoy roles. The punishment was widely seen as an attempt by Sir Keir to reassert his authority after the welfare revolt struck a hammer blow to his premiership.
Telegraph
3 days ago
- Politics
- Telegraph
Why Starmer's punishment beating won't bring Labour MPs to heel
Join the dots and it is not hard to work out what is going on with the punishment announced on Wednesday for seven Labour MPs who voted against the welfare bill. Sir Keir Starmer's personal authority took a major hit a fortnight ago when 127 Labour MPs – one in four – put their names to an amendment blocking his welfare cuts package. A year into power, a Prime Minister who won a House of Commons majority of a similar scale to Sir Tony Blair's was struggling to pass a proposed law he dubbed morally right and fiscally essential. The episode revealed deep failings in Downing Street's political intelligence operation, hubris among the Starmer inner circle and the dangers of rushing through sensitive reforms to save money. Most of it all lit up, in bright technicolour, a newfound willingness of an otherwise pliant Parliamentary Labour Party to speak back to the boss. Something, as they say, had to be done. The 'suspended four' And so we have the first step: four Labour MPs stripped of the whip – meaning they are now forced to sit as independents until further notice – and another three losing trade envoy appointments. Why not action against all 127 Labour MPs who put their name to the rebel amendment? Or all 49 ones who, even after the welfare bill was gutted of almost all savings, still voted against it? The explanation is in the numbers. The former would have wiped out the Government's majority, the latter taken a huge chunk from it. Action on that scale was unthinkable. So a more measured approach was needed, an attempt to show that defying the Prime Minister was not without consequence while also minimising the backlash. And so the four persistent critics of the Government have been singled out and scalped. They had committed 'repeated breaches of party discipline', to use the formal explanation briefed out by the Labour Party. This was true. Rachael Maskell has become one of the most vocal critics of Sir Keir on the Labour backbenches, penning articles about how to rebel and giving interviews about her newfound role as a thorn in the side of No 10. Chris Hinchliff was dubbed 'Nimby-in-Chief' by colleagues, recently leading an amendment to the Government's planning bill – one of Sir Keir's flagship pieces of legislation – to avoid the watering down of environmental protections. He is now tipped to join the Greens. Brian Leishman has hammered ministers over the closure of the Grangemouth oil refinery. Neil Duncan-Jordan challenged many cuts, including pushing to postpone the Winter Fuel Payment reduction. But the argument also gave No 10 cover for why many more rebels have not been reprimanded. Only those who crossed over some unspecified extra threshold got slapped down. We have seen this play before. In fact, just a year ago, when seven Labour MPs were stripped of the whip after voting to end the two-child benefit cap, defying the Government whip. It was a divide and conquer tactic. Four eventually returned to being Labour MPs, two remain on the naughty step as independents and the seventh – Zarah Sultana – has quit the party, vowing to start her own Left-wing movement. The message being sent is not subtle. 'Shoot one to educate thousands', as a former member of Team Starmer put it on Wednesday. But will it really work? PM under threat from Reform The Starmer of July 2024 is not the Starmer of July 2025. The former was at the height of his political power, having swept into office weeks earlier on a wave of anti-Tory sentiment, ending the party's 14 years all at sea in opposition. Now, Downing Street is struggling to show it has a plan for stopping Reform's poll-topping support surge which has got scores of Labour MPs in narrowly won seats jittery. Indeed, the real bite of the welfare rebellion came not from it being the 'usual suspects' but that concerns about the cuts package were so widespread they could be found across Labour's many factions. Will Dame Meg Hillier, the widely respected chairman of the Commons Treasury Select Committee who led the negotiating delegation to discuss the terms of the Government's climbdown, hesitate from rebelling again after this disciplinary action? There is no evidence to suggest the answer is yes – especially given she has escaped any telling off herself. Will Vicky Foxcroft, who was so opposed to the hastily put together welfare plan that she resigned as a Government whip, bite her lip in a repeat scenario because of this whips action on Wednesday? Unlikely. Cabinet overhaul Indeed, there was an immediate backlash from the Left – vows of 'solidarity with the suspended four' and howls of 'outrage' – that suggests in the short-term things will be more, not less, turbulent. More changes to right what went wrong with the welfare package are coming. No 10 is seeking advice and mulling over a summer 'reset'. An overhaul of Downing Street personnel, reforms to the machinery of Government and a ministerial reshuffle are all now widely expected ahead of the September party conference. The breadth, speed and scale of a shake-up – and whose Government careers are left in the bin – is all to be determined. But if the Prime Minister thinks a punishment beating of just seven of the 127 Labour MPs who defied him over welfare will bring this rebellious backbench to heel, he may be in for a nasty surprise.
Yahoo
11-07-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Public finances on ‘unsustainable' path due to spending promises, says OBR
The UK's state finances are on an 'unsustainable' path due to a raft of public spending promises the Government 'cannot afford' in the longer term, the boss of UK's official forecaster has warned. It came as the Office for Budget Responsibility said public finances are in a 'relatively vulnerable position' amid pressure from recent U-turns on planned spending cuts. State finances are facing 'mounting risks' but recent governments have had only limited success in improving the fiscal outlook, the OBR said. Richard Hughes, chairman of the organisation, indicated that governments will need to adjust spending plans in the longer term to avoid national debt ballooning. Downing Street however rejected suggestions that the Government is failing to heed warnings about the future of the public finances. Mr Hughes told a briefing in Liverpool that the projected rise in state pension spending linked to the triple lock commitment for annual increases was contributing to growth in national debt. He said the triple lock 'is one of a series of age-related pressures that pushes public spending upwards steadily over a number of years and, as you saw in our previous report, when you project trends in both pension spending and health and other age-related spending forward, the UK public finances are in an unsustainable position in the long-run. 'The UK cannot afford the array of promises that are displayed to the public if you just leave those unchanged, based on a reasonable assumption about growth rates in the economy and in tax revenues.' The triple-lock, which means state pensions increase by the highest of inflation, earnings growth of 2.5%, and a larger number of people above the pension age have caused a surge in spending on state pensions. The forecaster said the cost of the state pension has 'risen steadily over the past eight decades', from around 2% of GDP in the mid-20th century to the current 5% of GDP, or £138 billion, and is estimated to rise to 7.7% of GDP in the early 2070s. It added: 'Due to inflation and earnings volatility over its first two decades in operation, the triple lock has cost around three times more than initial expectations.' The OBR's annual fiscal risks and sustainability report suggested reversals of planned tax increases and spending reductions, such as the recently proposed welfare Bill and winter fuel allowance cuts, contributed to a continued rise in Government debt. The report said: 'Efforts to put the UK's public finances on a more sustainable footing have met with only limited and temporary success in recent years in the aftermath of the shocks, debt has also continued to rise and borrowing remained elevated because governments have reversed plans to consolidate the public finances. 'Planned tax rises have been reversed, and, more significantly, planned spending reductions have been abandoned.' UK public sector debt stood at 96.4% of GDP (gross domestic product) in May, according to latest figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS). The OBR said its annual fiscal risks and sustainability report that debt is projected to be 'above 270% of GDP by the early 2070s'. The forecaster added that recent rises in debts have led to 'a substantial erosion of the UK's capacity to respond to future shocks and growing pressures on the public finances'. The report also indicated that the state finances are likely to come under pressure in the longer-term from issues including significant growth in the cost of state pensions and climate-related factors. The OBR report also highlighted that the UK's finances faces 'daunting' risks in the near term, such as challenging conditions across the global economy, which have pushed up borrowing costs for governments. The yield on long-term UK Government bonds, called gilts, currently sits near to record highs, making it more costly for the Treasury to pay down its debt bill. It also highlighted that commitments for increased defence spending also pose another risk to the sustainability of public finances. Meeting the new Nato target that countries should spend 3.5% of GDP on core defence by 2035 will increase spending by a further £38.6 billion, the report said. Another major risk highlighted is potential cyber attacks, in light of recent assaults on the Legal Aid Agency, HMRC and Marks & Spencer. It predicted that a cyberattack on critical national infrastructure has the potential to temporarily increase borrowing by 1.1% of GDP. Climate change also 'poses significant risks to economic and fiscal outcomes in the UK'. There is 'an increasing likelihood of more severe impacts of climate change on economies', the OBR said, as the latest analysis now accounted for 'the impacts of higher precipitation and temperature variability'. As a result, the OBR has updated its estimates for the economic damage caused by climate change in both its best case scenario, 2C of warming, and its worst case, an increase of 3C. GDP could fall by 3.3% by 2060 in the event of 2C warming, the watchdog said, and 7.8% by 2060 in the 3C scenario. A Number 10 spokesman said: 'We recognise the realities set out in the OBR's report and we're taking the decisions needed to provide stability to the public finances.' Asked whether the Government was failing to heed alarm bells being sounded by the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR), the official said: 'No, I don't accept that. 'We have non-negotiable fiscal rules. Stability is the bedrock of growth as we've always said and that is why those fiscal rules are in place. 'But we recognise the long-standing economic realities the OBR sets out in its report.' The Conservatives criticised Labour's handling of the economy amid warnings from the OBR about the unsustainable future of public finances. Shadow chancellor Mel Stride said: 'While working families are tightening their belts, Labour have lost control of the public finances. 'The OBR's report lays bare the damage: Britain now has the third-highest deficit and the fourth-highest debt burden in Europe, with borrowing costs among the highest in the developed world. 'Under Rachel Reeves' economic mismanagement and Keir Starmer's weak leadership, our public finances have become dangerously exposed – vulnerable to future shocks, welfare spending rising unsustainably, taxes rising to record highs and crippling levels of debt interest.'
