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Kemi Badenoch has accused the Labour Government of having given up on trying to “live within its means”, as she criticised Rachel Reeves’s speech setting the stage for tax rises as “one long waffle bomb”. Giving her own speech in central London on Tuesday, the Tory leader said: “The Chancellor’s speech was one long waffle bomb, a laundry list of excuses. “She blamed everybody else for her own choices, her own decisions, her own failures.” Mrs Badenoch said Ms Reeves had delivered “a masterclass in managed decline” that left business leaders and investors “confused” because “Labour doesn’t have a plan to get Britain working”. She accused Sir Keir Starmer’s Government of no longer attempting to “live within its means”, saying to do so “is not austerity, it is respect for taxpayers”. She added: “They talk about working people while making life harder and harder for people who actually work, and worst of all, they pretend that what they’re doing is all necessary. “They pretend that they don’t have a choice. The reality is that they have given up trying to change anything. “They have given up trying to get the Government to live within its means, and they have given up on not raising tax. “That’s what Rachel Reeves was telling us this morning, and a Government that refuses to live within its means, while telling everyone else to tighten their belts, isn’t being fair, that Government is being hypocritical. “Getting the Government to live within its means is not austerity, it is respect. It is respect for taxpayers.” The Conservative Party leader said graduate jobs were down by a third since Labour took office, adding that is “not AI’s fault”. Mrs Badenoch said: “You can draw a direct line between what Rachel Reeves did in the budget last year and the dire prospects” faced by many graduates. She criticised “insane rates of marginal tax” and said “Britain has stopped working because for too many it has stopped making sense to work”. Mrs Badenoch also claimed Labour had “given up” trying to curb the disability benefits bill, after a review of personal independent payments, which started last week, was tasked with operating within the Office for Budget Responsibility’s existing projections for welfare spending instead of seeking savings. Ms Reeves earlier declined to recommit to Labour’s manifesto commitments not to raise income tax, national insurance or VAT, saying “we will all have to contribute”. She blamed global problems including the tariff war triggered by US President Donald Trump and domestic issues including the budget watchdog’s expected downgrade of economic productivity for the “hard choices” she will make.
