What does Labour actually stand for if it has problems with both profligacy and austerity?

In the early months of the 2010 parliament, David Cameron’s coalition government succeeded in establishing the narrative that the structural deficit was all the fault of Labour overspending, rather than the drastic collapse of tax revenues caused by a recession which itself was sparked by the global financial crisis. Now, the shoe is on the other foot and Keir Starmer’s party has been making hay with this government’s various self-inflicted mistakes, which have resulted, among other things, in a receptive audience willing to believe pretty much anything about the Conservative Party.

An example that springs to mind is the opprobrium Labour’s front bench poured on Liz Truss’s short-lived administration for seeking to implement unfunded tax cuts and spending increases without the imprimatur of the

Office of Budget Responsibility (OBR).

But today we see a different, much less convincing approach. Having moved swiftly on from criticising Truss for attempts to put more money in pockets, Labour is now targeting Rishi Sunak for seeking to apply the fiscal discipline that Truss eschewed.

Thus, both profligacy and austerity are now the enemies of the People’s Party, which begs the question: what does Labour actually think?

This confused philosophy is underwritten by a cynical assertion that is wheeled out whenever a front-bencher appears on the morning media round: all our problems were caused by Truss and Kwasi Kwarteng, her former chancellor, and all the measures announced by Jeremy Hunt today are aimed at repairing the damage caused by that fiscal event.

Yet there’s a key factor that Labour seems determined not even to mention: Covid lockdowns.

Indeed, it’s safe to assume that a Labour government would have embraced the principles of enforced school closures and confinement in our homes even more enthusiastically, and for longer, than did the Johnson government. So the eye-watering, unplanned and unanticipated bill for all of that would have been even higher than what it actually was. Questions about his approach to lockdowns might not plague Starmer now, but they will at the next election. And that isn’t the only trap set up for him. In hiring Patricia Hewitt, Sir Tony Blair’s health secretary, to review efficiency in the health service, Hunt is making an impression of cross-party consensus without the permission of the other party. It’s a political chess move that we’d usually expect from the likes of George Osborne.

There’s no doubt that Hunt and Sunak face a remarkable challenge. They need to focus voters’ minds on the real reason why Austerity 2.0 might be necessary – and that is key to whatever hopes the Tories have of winning back lost ground in the next two years. In the meantime, Hunt has produced a package that one could easily imagine having been presented by his Labour opposite number.

If voters can see the same thing, Labour will find the work of defining itself against the government much harder than originally thought.