No wonder Sir Keir Starmer is going abroad “for a few days” over New Year. The economic news here in the UK is unrelentingly gloomy.
The prime minister’s spokesman says the latest GDP figures show “the challenge of fixing the economy and public figures is huge and won’t happen overnight”.
Too right. The figures suggest the economy is flatlining and there was no economic growth in July, August and September this year: in other words, since the 4 July election.
But is it the Tories’ fault, as Number 10 claims: the “£22bn black hole” and all that? Or is Rachel Reeves’ budget that’s to blame, as the Tories insist?
Well, the poor growth figures surely can’t be blamed on the budget, because that wasn’t until 30 October, though gloomy predictions may have contributed.
And the “black hole”? Labour ministers constantly blame that for everything from unpopular tax rises to overcrowded prisons, a “broken” NHS and polluted rivers.
But it’s not just the disappointing GDP figures that will have Sir Keir heading for the sun lounger. (And, to be fair, the summer riots did wreck his August holiday plans.)
The CBI, which represents scores of UK firms, claims the economy is heading for “the worst of all worlds” and Bank of England governor Andrew Bailey last week expressed alarm over the budget tax hikes.
Cue Tory outrage: shadow business secretary Andrew Griffith slammed “a recession made in Downing Street” and shadow chancellor Mel Stride claimed: “The warning lights are flashing.”
Richard Holden, the shadow paymaster general, even called the chancellor a “modern-day Grinch”, the mean-spirited character who stole a…
