Senior Tories tell May not to ditch austerity
Belief that economy can be fixed with spending splurge is a fantasy, warn backbenchers
THERESA MAY has been warned not to abandon austerity amid indications she is willing to start spending again to secure a deal to stay in power.
Senior Tories said the “dynamics of sound financial policy” have not changed just because the Tories now need the support of the Democratic Unionist Party [DUP] to secure a majority.
George Osborne’s Evening Standard called claims austerity would be abandoned “worrying” while backbenchers said it was “fantasy” that economic problems could be solved by a spending splurge.
The UK national debt continues to rise at £5,170 a second and is fast aplitical proaching £1.9 trillion, despite years of spending cuts under the Conservatives.
The Tories went into this year’s election with a manifesto promising to balance the books by the “middle of the next decade” – a delay from the 2020 target promised two years earlier.
Now Mrs May appears to be willing to increase spending further after Labour’s election performance and DUP demands. The DUP are believed to be demanding more spending in Northern Ireland in order to agree support for Mrs May’s party.
Michael Gove yesterday appeared to confirm a change in emphasis in the wake of the Conservatives’ failure to win a majority. He said the Tories must “take account of legitimate public concerns about ensuring that we properly fund public services in the future”.
But James Cleverly, the MP for Braintree, said: “Public spending constraint has been going on for a very, very long time, we need to recognise that, but also money is still unbelievably tight.
“The idea there is some kind of po- choice to start spending money in huge amounts is a fantasy. We need to think about how we spend limited resource but also recognise a lot of people are really concerned about public services.”
But former minister Robert Halfon, sacked by Theresa May this week, said the party was “on death row”.
“We let ourselves be perceived primarily as the party of ‘austerity’,” he said in an article for the Sun.