Chancellor's Tax Giveaways Mean 'Savage' Spending Cuts

Kwasi Kwarteng must reverse his tax-cutting plans or impose a "savage" £60bn austerity hit to public services, experts and rebel Tories have warned. Britain is set for recession until 2024, forcing the chancellor to abandon his mini-Budget giveaways or make a "painful" public sector cut of 15 percent in order to get debt under control, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) found.

- Anna Isaac Andrew Woodcock

But any move to slash public services will face fierce opposition from some Conservative MPs as parliament reconvenes, putting pressure on Liz Truss following a chaotic party conference and turmoil in UK bond markets. One Sunak-supporting former minister told The Independent: "There is no way Tory MPs are going to stomach savage austerity in a post-Covid cost of living crisis. Liz has driven herself into a cul-de-sac."

Another former minister, who backed Sunak in the leadership contest, told The Independent that the chancellor "will find real difficulty getting spending cuts through parliament". They added: "I won't vote for them and a lot of my colleagues won't either."

The ex-minister said Mr. Kwarteng had failed to prepare the ground for last month's tax cuts or for the austerity that was likely to follow, which he warned would drive startled voters further away from the Tories. An obsession with ideological purity had come ahead of political planning.

"Until the 23 September mini-Budget, no one had factored in the need for any spending cuts," said the ex-minister. "They never talked about spending cuts during the summer's leadership campaign. It feels like they won the leadership on a false prospectus."

"Kwarteng has damaged his political credibility by intervening so clumsily," the ex-minister added. "It would be better for him to reverse the tax cuts now rather than cut public services, but it may not be enough to redeem his reputation."