Keir Starmer’s Labour has taken the ‘art’ of political lying to a whole new level, says Nick Timothy in the Telegraph. Denial after denial that it would raise taxes before the biggest tax-raising Budget in history. Here’s an excerpt.
Before the election Rachel Reeves said “we don’t need higher taxes. What we need is growth… and I have no plans to increase any taxes beyond those which we have already set out.” Then, Reeves said she would increase taxes by £8.5 billion, spending by £9.5 billion, and borrowing by £3.5 billion by 2028/29. Last week, she raised taxes by £40 billion, spending by £76 billion and borrowing by £36 billion.
This weekend, Reeves justified her broken promise, telling the BBC, “I didn’t know about the state of the public finances” before the election. But this was a lie on top of another lie. In June, before the election, her secret tax plans were reported in the Guardian. Labour sources had blabbed, saying upon arrival at the Treasury Reeves would claim to be surprised by her inheritance and seek a “doctor’s mandate” to raise taxes. “That is not what they are presenting the public with right now,” the sources admitted.
Such was the suspicion that Reeves would do this, she was forced to deny it in a pre-election interview in the Financial Times. “We’ve got the OBR now,” she said, explaining that the independent Office for Budget Responsibility meant “you don’t need to win an election” to know the details of the public finances. Among the tax rises she ruled out in that interview, two – capital gains tax and changes to inheritance tax reliefs – were in the Budget, and proposed in a report written by Reeves in 2018. …
And her claims about the so-called fiscal hole have also fallen apart. Before the Budget, the Treasury briefed the media that the OBR would publish a full breakdown of the £22 billion figure, and justify what Reeves has been saying since July. But that is not what happened. The OBR report identified £9.5 billion of in-year spending pressures – pressures of the kind that arise every year, and were never denied by the Tories – and said the remainder of Reeves’s claim was explained by Labour’s own public sector pay deals. “Nothing in our review,” the OBR Chairman said, “was a legitimisation of that £22 billion.” …
Reeves and her colleagues have taken the ‘art’ of political lying to a whole new level. Before the election the Environment Secretary, Steve Reed, said Labour had “no intention” of changing agricultural property relief for inheritance tax, and said it was “desperate nonsense” to claim otherwise. But the Budget cut the relief for thousands of farms. …
Keir Starmer was in on all those promises made during the election campaign, and he knew as well as Reeves did that he would break them. We have known since his Labour leadership campaign five years ago that such dishonesty is his modus operandi. Then, he promised to nationalise rail, mail, energy and water, end outsourcing in the public sector, get rid of Universal Credit and scrap tuition fees – only to drop the commitments as soon as he won.
Worth reading in full.
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If your majority is as big as theirs and lasts for another 4 something years, you can tell whoppers too.
Just like their PR unit (the BBC), they are accountable only to themselves.
The majority is built on fast sinking quicksand, it is a laughable, completely absurd majority based on 2 in 10 in a very low turnout. It’s the equivalent of your local Labour Club turning out to vote.
As to accountable, they most certainly are accountable: to thee and me. It used to be said people forgot what happened between elections but look where the Tories are. I fully expect Labour to be decimated in the Council elections and all but disappear in the next Election. People no longer forget or forgive.
Labour has lost most of the council byelections held since the election including a long held seat in York to Reform. I hope the MP that punched the bloke in the street is forced to go and we have a parliamentary byelection.
Keir Starmer has never been very good at that long-term vision thing. In opposition, he was constantly changing his view to chase votes and score political points over the other parties. Why would any sane person expect him and the government he leads to act any differently now?
“Keir Starmer’s Labour Takes the Art of Political Lying to a Whole New Level”
Only for those for whom history only started when they were born and have no knowledge or experience of Labour pre-1979.
Aneurin Bevan was Labour Health Minister responsible for creating the NHS and contributed greatly to setting up the welfare state.
He quipped: “The big secret about the National Insurance Fund is there ain’t no fund.” Ha, ha – you dummies… fooled ya.
Ironically.
He resigned in 1951 from Government with the introduction of prescription charges for dental and vision care AND the transfer of funds from the non-existent National Insurance Fund to pay for rearmament of the military.
Some big lies there.
Of course just the start – Labour has lied its way ever since – dodgy Iraq dossier? end of boom and bust, promise not to tax and spend – it’s Labour’s trademark. Liebour.
They even lied about inventing the NHS: they voted against it 20 times in total. The NHS proposal went through various forms by both the Liberals and Tories. Labour, essentially, based the NHS on the Tory proposal of 1945. Except they changed the funding. So here we are with a bag of very, very expensive shite.
I cannot possibly put it all better than Rosie Duffield, who, also said in an interview that she said to Starmer “I’d feel I had failed my Constituents”, his glib reply was something like “I’ve had years of failure because of not being in power”. For me that, allied with what Duffield said in her resignation letter, tells you all you need to know about Starmer. He wants power for powers sake and believes in nothing but feathering his nest and, as Duffield mentions, the nests of his pals. He has to rate as the most despicable of any politician I have ever had the misfortune to encounter.
Rosie Duffield’s resignation letter in full | Politics News | Sky News
To be honest, just being in power is what all the recent PMs have been all about. You have to go back to Thatcher for a leader with a clear vision.
Filthy communists. Liers and cheats. All of them. Incompetent, DEI hires.
Can you imagine how he looks to other leaders on the world stage. I mean even to establishment Brits he looks pretty spazzy. Hopefully Trump will deal with him I think he will given how Starmer tried to scupper Trump in recent weeks. And them maybe gradually there will be a traditionalist alignment in many places. It will have a semi-fascistic nature but show me an alternative.
If you have a leader with a face like a spanked arse then you can bet that you will be lumped in with him. That’s how it works. We see Russia or Iran as the leadership of those countries whether or not the leadership represents anything. You ought to at least replace him with someone more plausible. You shouldn’t assume that every country in the world has had its fighting spirit removed.
Starmer and co produce a gigantic amount of lies but the quality of them hasn’t been so good.
So I have a question.
When a party gets into power, but abandons its pledges and clearly has lied to the electorate, is there a legal case for calling the elections unlawful?
Perhaps those who lied should be subject to a recall where their electorate votes again.