A LABOUR MP has struggled to defend proposed budget cuts from the UK Government saying Rachel Reeves has “absolutely got this” despite being unable to define what austerity means.
Natalie Fleet was grilled on the upcoming Budget by presenter Jo Coburn on BBC Politics Live on Thursday as she said she believes there will be “no return to austerity”.
However, when questioned if planned cuts to unprotected departments would count as austerity, Fleet struggled to provide a convincing answer.
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It has been reported that Keir Starmer is facing a backlash from Angela Rayner and his cabinet over “huge” cuts to departmental spending which is expected to be revealed by Reeves later this month.
When asked her opinion on ministers writing to Starmer ahead of the Budget, Fleet said the UK is “broken” and that Labour “promised” to be financially responsible.
She said: “I don’t know about that, what I do know is people are going to be fighting for their departments because there is so much to do after 14 years of Tory cuts to everything.
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“The country is absolutely broken but we went out, and we promised people we would be financially responsible and that we would deliver for them as well.
“And people said to me ‘how are you going to do that?’, and I said, ‘you know what, we’re going to govern with Labour values’.”
Fleet said she trusted Reeves to deliver “as the first ever woman chancellor”.
The UK Government will deliver its Autumn Budget on October 30 and there are growing concerns that Reeves will announce around £40 billion of spending cuts with some departments facing reductions of as much as 20%.
The Labour MP was asked by presenter Coburn if there are cuts across departments if she agreed that would amount to austerity.
“I’m not going to get into the what ifs, because she’s absolutely got this, and we’ll see what she delivers,” Fleet said.
Coburn double-downed saying she wasn’t speculating on the contents of the budget as she said: “I’m just asking you the straightforward question.
“If there are cuts to unprotected departments from anything, from 10 to 20 per cent, in your mind, is that austerity?”
Fleet, who visibly struggled to answer the question, replied: “The reason that we are here is because we’ve got an absolutely massive”, before changing direction to state: “A country that is really sceptical about politics, they don’t trust us.
“Rachel has said there will be no return to austerity and I believe her.”
Coburn said that would “depend on what your definition of austerity actually is”.
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