By Ending a Harsh Conservative Welfare Policy, This Financial Plan Clearly Sets Out How Labour Will Fight the Battle to Revitalize Britain

Just recently, the chancellor, Rachel Reeves, presented a Labour Party budget. The public have been calling for Labour’s purpose and values to be more distinctly expressed. Through the decisions made – a transition to a fairer tax system, focusing on wealth to fund tackling child poverty, good public services and the living expenses – we have unequivocally demonstrated what we stand for.

That’s why Labour MPs cheered in the Commons, and it’s why we are ready for the battles to come. And it’s why the protests from the conservative side began immediately.

The Central Dividing Line in British Politics

The central division in British politics is yet again on the economy. On the one hand Labour, who aim to reform it so it helps everyday working people, and on the other, our political opponents, who support the current system and the unsuccessful doctrine of the past. We must now take on, and prevail in, the argument.

The Tories were given 14 years to fix things and instead, by any measure, they got far more dire. Their doctrinaire austerity and supply-side economics – tax cuts for the wealthy, reducing investment (leaving us with low productivity and wages), and neglecting to support young people after the pandemic – proved ineffective.

Legacy of Decline Under the Former Administration

Living standards fell by the biggest amount since records began, child poverty reached record levels, NHS waiting lists in England were the highest they’ve ever been, wages remained flat, a housing crisis became entrenched, young people scarred by Covid were abandoned. The history of failure goes on.

A single budget alone can’t put all this right, so Labour has a long-term plan for rebuilding and for restructuring the country. And we have to go out and keep making the argument for why our strategy will yield benefits.

Welfare Spending and Youth Deprivation

Under the Tories, welfare spending significantly increased. As did child poverty, because they didn’t address the underlying issues: low pay, high housing costs, deep inequalities in education, health and regions. The state is forced to paying more to deal with the effects instead of the cure.

It’s why we are building more affordable homes than for a generation, raising wages and enhanced protections for workers, greatly increasing investment in infrastructure and new industries, reducing waiting lists down and lowering the costs of childcare and energy as we drive for clean power.

Ending the Two-Child Limit

It’s also why we are absolutely right to use this budget to remove the two-child benefit cap.

For almost a decade, since it was introduced, poorer families with children have suffered from a unjust social experiment that was branded as fair for working people when it was the opposite. Most of the families impacted by it have a parent in work.

It has only served to push 300,000 more children into poverty – which, in the end, costs us more, as well as being heartless and unethical.

Tangible Effects in Communities

I know from my own district – where over 5,000 children will be lifted out of poverty as a result of ending the cap – the real impact it’s had. Children wearing £1 wellies as school shoes, children going to bed hungry and cold, living in overcrowded, mouldy homes, parents during the holidays relying on food banks for a modest meal or small gift for their kids.

I also see the impact on schools, teachers, social workers, doctors and charities who are already overburdened but have to divert time and resources to supporting children who are living with the results of severe deprivation.

Long-Term Effects of Youth Hardship

Just one in four pupils from the poorest families achieve five good GCSEs, compared with nearly three in four among affluent families. This sets them up for the challenges they face throughout their lives: unrealized potential, financial struggles and poor health. Children who were raised in poverty are more likely to be unemployed or poor as adults.

Confronting child poverty isn’t just a moral imperative, it is a future-oriented strategy. Poverty costs the economy far, far more than the three billion pound cost of removing the two-child cap, or extending free school meals.

That’s why we acted urgently in the budget, despite the very difficult economic context. Every day with this cap in place sees more than 100 extra children pushed into poverty. The effects of lifting it won’t happen overnight either, so acting early in the parliament was vital.

The cap was a symbol to 14 years of failed rightwing ideology. Now it is gone.

Equitable Funding for Measures

We, as Labour, can also be clear that these initiatives are being funded in a just way – from a new gambling levy, closing tax loopholes and a new “mansion tax”.

Final Thoughts

Equity and purpose – that’s how we will win the battle of ideas. This budget is a clear statement that we gained the election as Labour, and will govern as Labour. As I repeatedly said during my campaign to become deputy leader, we must reclaim the political platform and set the agenda more strongly about what’s truly flawed with the country and how we are fixing it. We’ve certainly done that this week.

So let’s keep hold of it and win this fight about how we will renew Britain and address the entrenched inequalities impeding progress.