The former cabinet minister Michael Gove has heavily criticised Liz Truss’s plans for tax cuts for the rich, saying her unfunded £45bn package had the “wrong values” and was not Conservative.
His intervention came as pressure from Tory MPs mounted for Ms Truss to perform a U-turn on controversial plans to axe the 45p income tax band, which gifts an average £10,000 to the 600,000 highest earners in the UK at a time when ministers are eyeing real-terms cuts to welfare benefits.
One former minister told The Independent the government would struggle to get the cut through the Commons when it comes before MPs in the new year, in what would be a virtually unprecedented rebellion against a Budget measure.
“The sensible thing to do might be to put it off, say that they will do it, but in a few years. Give themselves wriggle room,” he said.
Grant Shapps, the former transport secretary, joined Mr Gove in warning against the “politically tin-eared” plans.
Writing in The Times, he said that the government should not be making “big giveaways to those who need them least… not least because it is being paid for with borrowed money.”
And there was a furious response from backbenchers to Tory chair Jake Berry’s warning that rebels would be stripped of the whip, with one former minister telling The Independent: “A threat to expel people who won’t go along with this bats**t crazy cock-up is, frankly, bonkers.”
With many backbenchers already despairing over their prospects at the next election and little sign of Ms Truss compromising on the issue, a successful rebellion was “entirely possible”, said the ex-minister, adding: “Anyone trying to hold on to their constituency – or anyone thinking about their next job – won’t want blood on their hands from this.”
In a defensive TV interview on the first day of the Conservative conference in Birmingham, the prime minister confirmed reports that she was reviewing the pledge made by former chancellor Rishi Sunak of an inflation-matching rise of around 10 per cent to working-age benefits, and did not rule out cuts to public services.
She blamed communications blunders for the panic in the markets triggered by chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng’s mini-Budget last week.
But she told the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg that she stood by his plans, including the income tax cut and the scrapping of the cap on bankers’ bonuses.
Mr Kwarteng himself is expected to stick to his guns in a speech to conference on Monday that will be closely watched in the financial markets.
But former chancellor George Osborne said it was “touch and go whether the chancellor can survive”, telling Channel 4’s Andrew Neil Show it would be “curtains” if his speech went badly.
Johnson loyalist Nadine Dorries turned on the PM, accusing her of “throwing the chancellor under a bus” after Ms Truss revealed that cabinet had not been consulted on the 45p move and described it as “a decision the chancellor made”.
Another former minister told The Independent the attempt to distance herself from the controversial policy was “weird”, as it was “unthinkable” that she had not signed off on it.
But both Downing Street and the Treasury dismissed suggestions of a rift between the pair, with a No 10 source saying they were “completely united” and a source close to Kwarteng describing them as being “in lockstep on this”.
While denying he was a “rebel leader”, Mr Gove did not rule out voting against the abolition of the 45p band.
And other senior Tories stepped up the pressure for a U-turn, with backbencher Richard Graham saying the cut should be “pushed into the long grass” and former cabinet minister Julian Smith warning: “We cannot clap for carers one month and cut tax for millionaires months later.”
A total of at least 11 Tory MPs have now come out publicly against the change, with many more voicing loud discontent behind the scenes.
