‘Brexit plot’ to hammer Hammond

FORMER Chancellor Norman Lamont was accused yesterday of attacking Philip Hammond’s Budget because of the Chancellor’s opposition to a ‘hard Brexit.’

Pro-EU former Tory Minister Anna Soubry called leading Brexiteer Lamont ‘petty’ after he said Mr Hammond’s decision to raise National Insurance for the selfemployed, including white van drivers, was a ‘rookie error’.

Ms Soubry claimed many of the attacks on Mr Hammond were being driven by advocates of a hard Brexit who feared he was acting as a block in Cabinet against their agenda.

Criticism of the Chancellor was led last week by former Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith, a full-blooded Brexiteer.

Ms Soubry told The Mail on Sunday: ‘It is clear to me that some of the Brexit brigade are trying to pick off Mr Hammond over this issue because he has left no doubt he is opposed to walking away from the EU with no deal.

‘He is one of the few voices of reason in the Cabinet and with good reason, because we are sailing in dangerous waters. He knows leav- ing without a trade agreement would be an economic typhoon. People like Lord Lamont who want Brexit at any cost, regardless of the damage it does to our country, are using this to try to damage Mr Hammond. It is petty in the extreme.’ She added sarcastically: ‘I have not noticed any great affinity between Lord Lamont and white van man in the past.’

In his Budget speech, Mr Hammond poked fun at Lord Lamont, who was John Major’s Chancellor between 1990 and 1993, saying that ten weeks after he delivered the 1993 Spring Budget he was fired.

In his first response yesterday, Lord Lamont said: ‘Election pledges should not be lightly given...tax pledges cannot be lightly cast aside. My guess is that, in time, the Chancellor’s tax raid on the self-employed will be seen as a rookie error.’