It had to happen
Both the Daily Express and the Daily Mail have basically the same headline today, the economy is soaring why do Labour say we need tax cuts?
Well the economy is growing well, but no where near as well as it used to and even the last government called the general election early because there was no room for tax cuts in the Autumn.
In short they had spent all the money, handed it to the rich and had run down the state, to the extent that the NHS was and is in an awful position, the armed forces are a shadow of their former self and the prison system is collapsing.
But yes, now is the time for tax cuts, six months of below trend growth, after a recession and the inflation shock and we can spaff any spare money on tax cuts.
Labour will just have to put up with this tosh from the Tory press and the Tory party, it is always more difficult for Labour in this regard. But at least this time Tory supporters don’t seem to realise that people voted against them just over a month ago.
They are still trying to set the agenda based on the same stupidity and economic ignorance that failed and failed at the ballot box, and they cannot be allowed to succeed.
Economics, trade and Brexit, not necessarily in that order but the dog always comes first.
By Jonty Bloom Media
The stupidity of folk who should know better always amazes (though the Daily Wail and Daily Depress always manage it). The line that inflation is going down so goods are getting cheaper is beyond belief (no, numbnuts, they’re just getting more expensive less quickly). Maybe Sunak was right about needing more maths education
"Tory supporters don’t seem to realise that people voted against them just over a month ago."
More accurately, people did not vote for them.
Labour got 33.7% of the vote (barely more than the 32.2% Corbyn got in 2019) and the Tories 23.7%. Reform got 14.3%, so the combined right wing vote exceeded that of Labour. Its a fair bet that much of the increase in Lib Dem support (12.2%) came from the Tories.
If we had PR, we might now have a right wing coalition government.
This is bad news for Starmer and I'm sure he knows it. It validates his strategy of not frightening the voters since it permitted Tory voters to protest by voting Lib Dem. But his huge majority is an artefact of the electoral system rather than actual support. The voters didn't like the culture war nastiness of the Tories and they had plainly totally run out of ideas. Labour didn't scare them.
Starmer's problem of course is that he needs to spend money to change things but he is rightly worried about both financial market and voter reaction. But he has a mountain to climb in terms of changing public opinion to secure a further Labour victory.
The real issue is, following Will Hutton's thesis in his recent book, the voters have historically been ill informed about the economics of a successful country and the laissez faire ideology is deeply embedded. Arguably individualist Britain now suffers from too little solidarity and too many no longer care about those who lose out in Tory economics.