London MPs have reacted to the economic fall-out following the Chancellor’s mini-budget last week.
Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng laid out his economic vision of a new path in British economic history last Friday with the biggest tax cutting exercise since 1972.
However, there has been volatility across London and international markets, culminating in a Bank of England intervention.
Key policies included increasing of the threshold before stamp duty is paid to £250,000 and the removal of the current 45% top rate of tax for high earners.
Without the usual costing review from the Office of Budget Responsibility the government, fiscal authorities and the central Bank’s monetary authority policies have all pulled in opposite directions.
Such disparities have been mirrored by MPs from across London and the political spectrum.
The Shadow Foreign Secretary and MP for Tottenham, David Lammy, criticised the Conservatives, insisting: “Politics is not a game.”
His quotes followed a report by hospital bosses that found some nurses are forgoing food on shifts in order to feed their children.
Lammy added: “The Conservatives are pushing their ideology at any cost to the public’s pensions, mortgages and cost of living.”
This tweet references how the cost of government borrowing ripples through to interest rates which cumulatively effect mortgages and pensions.
Similarly, Labour MP for Ilford North Wes Streeting has underlined the fall in sterling over the past week.
Streeting remarked: “Conservatives like three word slogans, but I never thought that ‘sink the pound’ would become one of them.”
On the other side of the political debate, the Chief secretary to the Treasury and Conservative MP for Croydon South Chris Philp has supported the government’s tax plans.
In a recent tweet Philp chose to highlight the ostensibly more popular energy policies that were announced last week.
The budget has faced cross-party critiques with the Leader of the Liberal Democrats, Ed Davey, urging the Prime Minister to recall parliament, following interventions from the Bank of England.
Fellow Liberal Democrat and MP for Twickenham, Munira Wilson, echoed her Leader’s demand to recall parliament amid the crisis in sterling, highlighting the need for MPs to deal with the economic fluctuations.
Wilson also labelled the budget: “Unfair and irresponsible.”
The Women’s Equality Party referenced the pressures caused by increasing inflation, warning that inequality will only worsen following last Friday’s announcements.
