Rachel Reeves spent Sunday morning touring the broadcast studios as she attempted the traditional pitch roll for this week’s spring statement. The chancellor had a headline in mind, and her confirmation that she will seek a 15 per cent reduction in administrative costs across Whitehall, amounting to about £2 billion a year, receives comprehensive coverage today.
Newspapers have focused on the backlash to Reeves’ comments among unions representing civil servants. That is but one of myriad narrative threads to watch this week, as Reeves returns to the despatch box to update MPs on the government’s fiscal and economic programme.
The Conservative Party, represented by shadow chancellor Mel Stride across the airwaves yesterday, has decided of its own accord that the fiscal event is an “emergency budget”. The stock phrase befits the party’s political framing: that Reeves’ statement is charged with undoing the damage wrought by her tax-raising autumn budget.
This line is designed to do battle with the government’s rhetorical position. Ministers insist the “world has changed” — and that the instability incited by geopolitical developments necessitates a more profound fiscal rewiring than that foreseen by the autumn budget.
All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Healthcare Workers established to highlight key areas of concern for healthcare professionals
New Humanist magazine joins Humanists UK in historic charity merger
But media interest this week will instead dissect the looming battles within Labour. MPs situated on the government’s backbenches, beleaguered after recent announcements on welfare and international aid, await the latest round of fiscal measures to be foisted over them. Some stand ready to decry what they perceive as “austerity 2.0” — a label government spokespeople vehemently deny.
***This content first appeared in Politics.co.uk’s Politics@Lunch newsletter, sign-up for free and never miss our daily briefing.***
Reeves’ reputation in Labour has been at a low ebb for some time now. The winter fuel payment cut, the chancellor’s first major contribution to the business of government in July 2024, exacted a heavy and lasting toll. After eight months in office, the Treasury leads other departments as the primary target of hostile briefings. MPs privately rue the government’s self-imposed fiscal rules and its election tax pledges, which Reeves boasted proud ownership of during opposition.
A LabourList survey published last week, conducted by Survation for the grassroots website, listed Reeves as the cabinet minister viewed least favourably among the Labour membership. The chancellor’s net rating of -11.19 placed her dead last among her cabinet colleagues — one below work and pensions secretary Liz Kendall on -7.49.
(Kendall and Reeves were the only cabinet ministers to receive negative ratings. Keir Starmer stood on +13.83.)
The cabinet “league table”, in the style of ConservativeHome’s famous monthly ranking, reflects an interesting relationship between a minister’s standing among the grassroots and their prominence in government.
Wes Streeting, Kendall and Reeves made up three of the league table’s bottom four. The government grid of recent weeks has been apportioned among the announcement of NHS England’s abolition, the welfare reforms and the spring statement. Meanwhile, topping the list were Ed Miliband, Angela Rayner and Lisa Nandy — ministers historically the subject of speculation they have been, or are about to be, sidelined.
In other words: the more distant a cabinet minister is to the centre of power in No 10, the more likely they are to be favoured by Labour members. (There are some exceptions to this reductive rule, naturally).
But this general pattern is explicable. No 10 is governing against the progressive instincts professed by the Labour membership. The reputations of Miliband, Rayner and Nandy stand to the left of the government’s chosen ideological path.
And lo, the government’s trajectory will continue this week at the spring statement. In the face of internal criticism, Reeves will underline her abiding support for the government’s fiscal rules and swing her scythe across unprotected departments.
Anneliese Dodds, departing as international development minister earlier this month, urged the government to rethink its fiscal rules. But Dodds’ call to “collectively discuss our fiscal rules and approach to taxation, as other nations are doing” has fallen on deaf Treasury ears.
It is a decision Reeves will own on Wednesday.
The prime minister gave a preview of what is in store in an interview with BBC Radio 5 Live this morning. Speaking from 10 Downing Street, Starmer confirmed the government would be “looking across the board” at departmental cuts.
***This content first appeared in Politics.co.uk’s Politics@Lunch newsletter, sign-up for free and never miss our daily briefing.***
The prime minister said: “We’re not going to alter the basics, but we are going to look across and one of the areas that we will be looking at is: can we run the government more efficiently?
“Can we take some money out of the government? And I think we can.
“I think we’re essentially asking businesses across the country to be more efficient, to look at AI and tech in the way that they do their business.”
The spring statement, originally billed as a routine update on the economic and fiscal outlook, will mark another milestone in the government’s evolution — and an integral moment for Reeves. The chancellor’s apparently unambiguous support from No 10 means the personal political stakes are not as high as they might otherwise be. But every other indicator suggests that when the chancellor takes to the commons despatch box on Wednesday afternoon, she will do so from a position of political weakness, not strength.
Problems could arise for the government if Labour MPs sense that vulnerability — and seek to capitalise. Could this be the week the soft left, ridiculed as political invertebrates by its intra-party critics, finds its spine?
Lunchtime briefing
Lord Frost floats Tory pact with Reform by 2028: ‘We can’t go into an election divided’
Lunchtime soundbite
‘We do not live in a world of academia and think tanks. That’s not what modern politics is about. It’s a street fight. You’ve got to get out there…
‘We’re not doing enough to earn the respect from others, journalists, political parties or the public, because we’re not doing that.’
— The Conservative mayor of Tees Valley, Ben Houchen, issues thinly veiled criticism of Kemi Badenoch. Via The House magazine (more below)
Now try this…
‘Pothole fixing progress by councils to be ranked’
BBC News reports.
‘Ben Houchen: “I Don’t Have A Bad Word To Say About How No 10 Have Engaged With Me”’
Via The House magazine.
‘Can Rachel Reeves recover?’
A chancellor playing a long game must hope she does not have to wait too long, writes the NS’ George Eaton. (Paywall)
