Jeremy Hunt missed this one pivotal word out of his 65-minute Budget speech

The Tories are choosing to blow billions of pounds on pre-election tax giveaways in a desperate bid for votes (Picture: UK PARLIAMENT)

In my 14 years in Parliament, I’ve had to endure numerous devastating Budgets, Spending Reviews, Spring and Autumn Statements – not to mention that infamously disastrous mini Budget.

Yet the sheer cruelty of the Tories’ final cut-and-run Budget on Wednesday still took my breath away.

As this Government started, so they finished: swinging the axe of austerity to the very bitter end. The first cut may be the deepest, but the last was inflicted on a country which is now on its knees after almost a decade-and-a-half of abject Tory failure.

In the face of dire economic straits, Rishi Sunak’s party will point the finger of blame anywhere but themselves – from wars and Covid-19 to diversity schemes and paperwork, council mismanagement and Whitehall waste.

There was no mention of Brexit. No reflection on the billions lost to cronyism, corruption and incompetence. Most crucially of all, it appears there is no acknowledgement of the fundamental truth that austerity has proven a total and dismal failure. 

The Government can tell the British public the economy has turned a corner and it is levelling up until it is blue in the face. It is nonetheless completely at odds with the grim reality for millions of people who can no longer make ends meet, however hard they try.

Rishi Sunak’s party will point the finger of blame anywhere but themselves (Picture: via REUTERS)

If people were ‘just about managing’ under Theresa May, they are not managing at all anymore.

One in five Brits have now fallen into poverty. Last month, 15% of households went hungry. And last winter, in supposedly one of the richest countries in the world, cold and damp homes contributed to the estimated excess deaths of almost 5,000 people.

As our schools, roads and hospitals crumble around our ears and council after council teeters on the brink of bankruptcy, the whole country was crying out for urgent and transformative levels of public investment. 

But desperate pleas from all sides fell on deaf ears, as the Chancellor once again chose to raid the public purse with yet more tax cuts for the rich.

The Tories may like to claim there is no money left, but in this Budget they chose to blow billions of pounds on pre-election tax giveaways in a desperate bid for votes, rather than keeping those revenues to invest in public services that would help the poorest households in the country.

Those families will receive just 3% of the benefits of the 2p cut to national insurance and changes to child benefit according to analysis from the New Economics Foundation. The richest 20% will get 13 times more than the poorest.

There can be no defence for this Government’s abject failure (Picture: JESSICA TAYLOR)

And the decision to freeze fuel duty for the 14th year, which analysis from Carbon Brief suggests has increased UK emissions by as much as 7% and already cost us over £90 billion in lost revenues, will be of little help to the poorest households – around 40% of whom don’t even own a car.

To see the Chancellor smiling and gloating about cutting taxes in the middle of a nationwide cost-of-living crisis will be a slap in the face to millions of people who have had enough of broken Britain.

This budget offered no hope for desperate councils, nothing to help renters, no support to insulate cold, damp homes, and bring emissions down at the pace we need to meet our climate commitments, which now hang by a thread. 

Because once again, there was a gaping climate-shaped hole at the heart of this final Tory budget.

Not only did the world’s greatest challenge (‘climate’) fail to get a single mention in the Chancellor’s 65 minute speech, there was also next to nothing in new green investment, despite the urgent need for the UK to spend an absolute minimum of 1% of GDP to reach our climate commitments and calls from MPs across parties to scale up funding at this time-critical juncture.

To see the Chancellor smiling and gloating about cutting taxes will be a slap in the face to millions of people (Picture: UK PARLIAMENT)

There can be no defence for this Government’s abject failure to invest in both liveable homes and a liveable planet.

Yet it is a failure that Labour looks set to repeat as they back the terrible spending cuts inflicted in this Budget and parrot the same, tired lies that there is no money left, the other guys maxed out the credit card, and climate change will have to wait until their fiscal rules allow.

The country cannot go on like this.

If we don’t come together now to thoroughly reject and dismantle the very concept of austerity, we will have another five years ahead of us where our public services become more impoverished and the climate emergency exacts ever higher costs.

Whether it is Labour or the Conservatives in power, that would be a dereliction of duty future generations will neither understand, nor forgive.

Do you have a story you’d like to share? Get in touch by emailing Ross.Mccafferty@metro.co.uk. 

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