Dan Hodges on budget leaks

Dan Hodges has a very powerful piece in the mail about the shambles of a budget last week

Here is an extract.

"Finally. After the days of obfuscation, deflection and flat-out lying surrounding Rachel Reeves's Budget deceit, Kemi Badenoch has cut through to the heart of the issue. 

Tuesday saw the scandal's first resignation, with Office for Budget Responsibility head Richard Hughes falling on his calculator after the leak of his organisation's Budget report 45 minutes before the Chancellor addressed the Commons. It had been, he said, 'a technical but serious error'.

Though rumour holds he was pushed by the Prime Minister and Chancellor, who were desperate to find a scapegoat for the most shambolic fiscal event in modern parliamentary history. Yet in their willingness to sacrifice Hughes, they made a fatal blunder. One that the Leader of the Opposition exploited to ruthless effect at Prime Minister's Questions today.

Given Sir Keir Starmer had accepted Hughes's resignation, she asked provocatively: Did he believe people should step down when they are in charge of organisations that 'descend into a total shambles'? 

Starmer tried to waffle and evade.

At which point Badenoch pinned him to the wall. The head of the OBR had quit because his organisation had mistakenly leaked sensitive economic information less than an hour before the Budget was officially published. But the Chancellor and her aides had been doing the same over a period of weeks, she pointed out.

This had destabilised the markets. Hundreds of thousands of pensioners had rushed to withdraw their funds early. The briefings hadn't just damaged the economy, but were a potential breach of Financial Conduct Authority regulations. So if Hughes had to take responsibility, why not ministers? Would the Prime Minister ensure Reeves complied with an investigation to get to the bottom of the matter?


I was watching their exchange from my place in the Parliamentary press gallery. And from that vantage point, you can tell when Starmer is in trouble. His body tenses. He leans into the despatch box, as if for support. His eyes begin to flick ever more desperately to his briefing book, in the hope salvation is lurking somewhere in its pages.

And, the biggest tell of all, he becomes abusive. 'She's losing the plot', Starmer spat.

What he noticeably didn't do was agree to ensure his Chancellor would co-operate with any investigation into the chaos of the past month. For a simple reason: he knows Rachel Reeves is bang to rights. As one minister told me on Tuesday, 'He knows that if the FCA investigates, Reeves is toast.'


Quite.

You can read the whole article at

DAN HODGES: Rachel Reeves is bang to rights. And in his eagerness to find a scapegoat, Starmer has now made a fatal blunder


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