Latest updates: chancellor urges wealthy recipients of rebate to donate money to charity as he details £15bn support package
Here are the main points from Rishi Sunak’s morning interviews.
People can judge me by how I’ve acted over the last couple of years. I’ve always been prepared to respond to the situation on the ground, what’s happening to the economy, what families are experiencing and making sure we’ve got policies in place to support them through that.
In terms of ‘is it one-off?’, what’s happening next year, I’d go back to what I said earlier. I do want people to be reassured and confident that we will get through this. We will be able to combat and reduce inflation, we have the tools at our disposal and after time it will come down.
Today’s announcement is a big package of support for households this year. But it is not without risks. In particular, if oil and gas prices remain high then the government will doubtless come under pressure to continue the additional household support for at least a further year. Extending the 5p cut to fuel duties and the £9 billion help with energy bills announced in the March spring statement and the £15bn of additional giveaways for households announced by the chancellor today for a further 12 months would add a further £26bn to borrowing in 2023-24.
What is likely to happen is that benefits and pensions next year will go up by this year’s much higher inflation levels. That is forecast to be much higher than the inflation that people will actually experience next year. So, for all those people they can look at next year and actually feel relatively confident about that.
First and foremost I’m a fiscal conservative, I believe it’s incredibly important that I manage the country’s finances responsibly. That means after suffering the shock we did to get our borrowing and debt levels back on a sustainable trajectory.
If the government hadn’t have been resisting Labour’s calls for a windfall tax and this additional support for months, the government could have taken the time to get this package right.
It is not right that if you own a second or a third home you should get this £400 payment multiple times. You can now get a situation where somebody who’s incredibly wealthy gets £400 on three or four occasions because they own so many properties.
