Shadow Chancellor Sir Mel Stride took to a London stage today on a mission to rescue the Conservatives’ economic reputation so the Tories can escape polling oblivion.
Sir Mel knows there is no hope of Kemi Badenoch’s returning to power if the party is not trusted on the economy. The Conservatives are in a battle for survival.
The latest poll of polls puts the party on just 18%, behind Labour (23%) and Nigel Farage’s Reform UK (30%).
But this was not a speech in which he would focus his fire solely on his Labour opposite number, Rachel Reeves. He decided to address the country’s memories of the economic turmoil unleashed in the wake of former PM Liz Truss’s mini-Budget.
More than that, he fired blasts at the Tories’ new rivals for the centre-Right vote, Nigel Farage’s Reform UK – comparing their policies to those of former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn.
And he kicked off with an understatement: “Today my party is in a difficult place.”
There was no attempt to defend Ms Truss’s decisions during her short-time in Number 10. Instead, this was an exercise in contrition.
He told the audience gathered at the Royal Society of Arts: “Many have lost trust in us and many are right to be angry.”
The audience included former Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby and former Conservative leadership candidate Sir John Redwood, a champion of privatisation in the Thatcher era.
Sir Mel admitted the Conservative party was “seen to have failed” when it came to acting responsibly and delivering prosperity for families.
He said he shared people’s frustrations, adding that his party “cannot begin to win back the public’s trust until we have shown we understand their disappointment and their anger”.
Describing the impact of the Truss era, he said: “The credibility of the UK’s economic framework was undermined by spending billions on subsidising energy bills, and tax cuts, with no proper plan for how this would be paid for.”
Sir Mel then took aim at Mr Farage, saying: “Populists in particular claim there are easy answers to our problems, telling voters what they want to hear without any credible plan for how they might deliver.
“Take Reform. Their economic prescription is pure populism. It doubles down on the ‘magic money tree’ we thought had been banished with Jeremy Corbyn.
“They would plough ahead with huge additional welfare spending, as well as tax cuts, with no plan for how to pay for any of it.”
Turning his sights on the present Chancellor, he said: “By borrowing hundreds of billions more than the plans she inherited, and pushing up the rates we pay on that borrowing, Rachel Reeves has added nearly £80billion to our expected debt interest bill over the course of this parliament.
“At the Spending Review next week we can expect her to trumpet all of the additional projects and programmes she is funding – without mentioning the fact it is all being paid for from borrowing.”
Sir Mel understands attack lines alone will not restore the Conservatives’ fortunes, admitting that “young voters have simply stopped listening to us. The average age of a Conservative voter at the last election was 63.”
He acknowledged the gloom surrounding the economy, saying: “In real terms the average British worker is no better off now than they were in 2008. Average living standards in our country are around those of the poorest US state, Mississippi.
“Some estimates suggest that average incomes in Poland will exceed those in the UK by 2035.”
But this was not the day when he would announce a set of policies designed to transform the country’s economic fortunes.
Sir Mel pledged: “We will need to take our time if we are to forge a credible plan that delivers for the people of our country. Over the next four years my party will do just that.”
But if had hoped to definitively consign the Truss era to the pass there was a hitch.
Ms Truss issued a statement, blasting the Shadow Chancellor.
She said: “Mel Stride was one of the Conservative MPs who kowtowed to the failed Treasury orthodoxy and was set on undermining my plan for growth from the moment I beat his chosen candidate for the party leadership…
As it was, Mel Stride and too many fellow travellers in the Conservative parliamentary party supported an economic policy that backed high immigration, raised taxes to a 70-year high and pursued unaffordable Net Zero policies – and the electorate delivered a devastating verdict on that record last summer.
“Until Mel Stride admits the economic failings of the last Conservative Government, the British public will not trust the party with the reins of power again.”
A Labour spokesperson said: “The Tories may want to distance themselves from Truss, but they’re still making the same unfunded commitments, most of them were in her team, and many including Badenoch praised her.”
Ahead of the speech, Reform UK deputy leader Richard Tice said: “We’ll take no lectures on economics from a party that more than doubled the national debt, raised taxes and government spending to 70 year highs and shrank economic growth to 70 year lows.”
