Rachel Reeves bats off attacks from fellow Labour MP after Spring Statement

Chancellor Rachel Reeves has hit back after a fellow Labour MP said making cuts instead of taxing wealth was a ‘political choice’.

In the Spring Statement she announced cuts to welfare amounting to £3.4 billion in 2029/30 and Whitehall spending, saving £2 billion.

However Labour MP Richard Burgon, a former shadow Treasury minister, said: “Making cuts instead of taxing wealth is a political choice, and taking away the personal independence payments from so many disabled people is an especially cruel choice.

“A disabled person who can’t cut up their own food without assistance, and can’t go to the toilet without assistance, and can’t wash themselves without assistance will lose their personal independence payment.

“So hasn’t the Government on this taken the easy option of cutting support for disabled people rather than the braver option which would be to tax the wealthiest through a wealth tax?”

Reeves responded: “There is nothing progressive, there is nothing ‘Labour’ about not supporting people who are disabled and sick and young people to do jobs that are commensurate with what they are able to do.”

“In the Budget last year, we got rid of the non-dom tax status, we increased capital gains tax, we introduced VAT on private schools and we changed the rules of inheritance tax, so I don’t recognise what (he) says.”

She added: “The mini budget delivered by the party opposite led to higher bills, higher rents and higher mortgage costs.

“It was not the wealthy who suffered most when they crashed the economy – it was ordinary working people.

“And they are still feeling the effects, two and a half years later, of the damage caused.”

The government has put itself in a difficult position when it comes to raising taxes, as during its election campaign last year Labour committed to not raising income tax, national insurance or VAT.

In October the Chancellor targeted £9.9 billion buffer against taxes, but this has become harder to achieve thanks to higher debt costs, with Donald Trump’s erratic leadership of the US being a contributing factor.