Reform UK’s plans to reduce public spending include a glaring black hole, according to Conservative Shadow Chancellor Andrew Griffith.
Asked if he was saying Reform’s sums do not add up, he told the Camilla Tominey Show on GB News: “Yes, I am. Yes, I am saying that. And there’s a lack of consistency. So others already have talked about some of the numbers and the imperfections in those. I’ll leave that to them. But having looked at those numbers, they don’t add up.
“Every time there’s a Reform event, a Reform conference, a Reform spokesman, the policy is different. Richard Tice said they were going to cut inheritance tax. Rob Jenrick says they’re not. All sorts of policies on the two-child benefit cap.
“Don’t get me wrong. We need to grow this country. We need radical reform of the public finances. The Conservatives will do that.”
He said Reform’s spending plans include debt interest savings: “You can’t bank a saving from a lower interest rate. The markets will take their own view on that, and that is included within that £100 billion.”
Griffith also said that the Tories plan to cut welfare beyond the £23 billion target that has been previously stated: “23 billion is our number. I’m not getting into an auction of promises. There’s more to go for, so you should take that as a floor, not a ceiling, on our ambition.
“We’ll do many things to get people into work, as well as cracking down on those who are treating welfare as a lifestyle choice, we’ve said we will repeal the whole of Labour’s job-destroying measures in its unemployment act. That’s what’s cost over 190,000 people their jobs, allowing one in six young people, sadly, to be unemployed. That is no future for our country.
“And working with Helen Whately and my shadow team, we will be bringing forward plans to reform all sorts of spending, get this country building, get this country growing, get people back into work, cheaper energy, cutting taxes, cutting red tape, and once again backing business. That’s how you grow an economy.
“It’s not unique to this country. Others have picked themselves up and turned round their trajectory of travel in the past. That is the plans that we’ll be making and do so again.”
Griffith said Chancellor John Healey should resign, following the change in the government’s defence spending plans: “I mean, it’s just not credible, is it? And the trouble is that the markets sense it’s not credible either. The gap on defence spending, the optimistic forecasts about fiscal restraint in the out years of the plan that the Labour Party show no sign of being able to deliver the complete absence of welfare reform – it’s why the UK is having to pay the highest rate of interest on its debt for 28 years.
“That is no way to run an economy. So they need to fix this, fix this fast. Or, as you say, the Chancellor needs to resign. Or, if the prime minister won’t fund the defence of our nation, as Kemi Badenoch said, he needs to call a general election and explain why it’s okay to abrogate the very first duty of government.”