By Krishnan Guru-Murthy

Copyright channel4

We spoke to Chancellor Rachel Reeves about Labour’s start in government, Nigel Farage’s proposed plan to scrap indefinite leave to remain, the November budget and how likely the UK is to see tax rises, and whether she would support Andy Burnham to be the next Labour leader.

We began by asking her about Labour’s plan to guarantee paid work for unemployed young people.

Rachel Reeves: They will be offered skills, training, one-to-one support to find work. If they’re not able to find work at the end of those 18 months, there will be a guarantee of a job offer.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: And if they don’t take it, they’ll lose the benefit?

Rachel Reeves: Yes, and there’s always been that system in the UK that there is something in return.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: This idea is also being applied to indefinite leave to remain, by the sound of it. Shabana Mahmood is coming up with the idea that you’ve got to be a volunteer, you’ve got to have a job if you want to get settled status. Isn’t it a bit insulting to say to an Indian doctor, say, who is working 60, 70 hours a week that in order to get settled status here, he’s also got to volunteer?

Rachel Reeves: We want people to contribute if they come to our country, and by and large people do contribute. At the moment, you have to be here for five years, and what we’re saying is that should be ten years.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: And do volunteer work?

Rachel Reeves: There’s lots of different ways to contribute, and if you’re working in the NHS, you’re clearly contributing to our country and our society. But that’s in sharp contrast to what Nigel Farage is saying. What Reform is saying is that if someone is in this country legally, working and contributing, that they could be deported. Now, there are lots of your viewers who at work today are sitting next to somebody who wasn’t born in Britain. They’re dropping their kids off at school in the morning, and another parent might not have been born in Britain, but is going out to work. A lot of your viewers will be married to somebody who wasn’t born in Britain, and they may be the parents of their children. And those people have got every right to be in this country, and the idea that they would be deported just because they weren’t born here, I believe that policy is racist, I believe the policy is wrong.

“I don’t think people who vote for Reform are racist.”
– Rachel Reeves MP

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: What kinds of people come up with racist policies, if they’re not racist?

Rachel Reeves: Nigel Farage will have to answer for himself, as I have to for myself, but I’ve always tried to focus on the policies rather than bring it down to personalities, but I believe this is a wrong policy.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: Do you worry that lots of Reform supporters now are worried that if not you, but other people here, are calling them racist?

Rachel Reeves: No, I don’t think people who vote for Reform are racist. A lot of people want change, but this Labour government are changing things. We’ve increased the national living wage and the national minimum wage so that work pays. There’s been five cuts in interest rates to take money off of people’s mortgages. We’re rolling out breakfast clubs and free school meals. We’ve cut NHS waiting lists by 200,000. We’re helping people get on the housing ladder.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: But people aren’t feeling it is the trouble, isn’t it? You’ve got the budget coming up and obviously you’re not going to tell us what’s in it, but as a principle, last time around you said, ‘I’m not going to come back for more big tax rises. This is a one-off, we’ve fixed it now’, and clearly you haven’t and you’re going to have to come back for more.

Rachel Reeves: What we did last year was fix the mess that we had inherited. And we inherited a massive hole in the public finances and also public services on their knees. And so we did what was necessary, but I think all of your viewers will acknowledge that the world has been incredibly volatile this last year. And I’m chancellor in the world as it is, not the world as I would wish it to be.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: You did say the world had changed, but then you didn’t change your own framework.

Rachel Reeves: No, and that was the right approach because already as a government, one in ten pounds of what we spend is on servicing government debt. There is nothing progressive, nothing patriotic, about spending money paying back debts wrapped up by the previous Conservative government.

“We inherited a massive hole in the public finances and also public services on their knees.”
– Rachel Reeves MP

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: There’s a lot of politics here at conference as ever. In 2015, I think you introduced Andy Burnham as a potential leader of the Labour Party. You were one of his big backers. You would have been his chancellor. Do you think he’d still make a good leader?

Rachel Reeves: I did back Andy for the leadership in 2015, but we have a leader who I backed for the leadership in 2019, and that leader is Keir Starmer. He was elected last year to turn our country around after 14 years of the Conservatives. Andy was elected to serve the people of Greater Manchester, and I want people to get on doing the job they’re doing.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: He said there was a climate of fear in this party. Is there a climate to fear? He’s clearly scared to speak out.

Rachel Reeves: Well, he’s been speaking out.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: But he’s worried about it, isn’t he? He’s talking about…

Rachel Reeves: He’s clearly not scared to speak out, Krishnan, and that’s what he has been doing. But people have also got a job to do, and the prime minister’s job is to run the country, and my job is to turn around our economy. I’m really proud that in the first 15 months of this government, we’ve had the fastest-growing economy in the G7. We’ve had five cuts in interest rates. We’ve secured trade deals with the United States, India and the EU.

Krishnan Guru-Murthy: But despite all of that, you are in a historically terrible position in the polls. The public are not happy with this government. How much personal responsibility do you take for the position of the government in the opinion polls right now?

Rachel Reeves: Of course, Keir and me take responsibility for what is happening in our country today. But we were elected to get on and do a job in very difficult circumstances. The global environment is a challenging one. Growth was not strong enough in the last parliament. Living standards were on their knees, and so were public services. So there’s a big job to be done. People voted Labour because they wanted change. We are turning things around. Is there more to do? Absolutely.

Watch more here:

Starmer calls Reform migrant policy ‘racist’ and immoral’ at Labour conference
Reform will ‘tear families apart and hit economy’ – housing minister
‘Bringing fight to Reform’ will turn things around – Baroness Debbonaire