The chief secretary to the Treasury Darren Jones has claimed Britain is still suffering from the trauma of Liz Truss’ mismanagement of the economy.
Asked about the market response to Rachel Reeves’ budget, Darren Jones told Sky News that “markets always respond to budgets in the normal way.”
“There’s a lot of new information about the economy and the nation’s finances presented to Parliament, and it’s normal for markets to respond,” he claimed.
He went on to say: “I think we’ve all got PTSD from Liz Truss and just let’s compare the two different scenarios, because they’re very, very different: So, under Liz Truss, as we saw, they sacked permanent secretary, they ignored the independent Office for Budget Responsibility.
“They announced £45 billion of unfunded tax cuts and said they were only just getting started. And then the market went mad and we all know what happened.”
His comments come after Rachel Reeves established a new Office for Value for Money. This independent body will be tasked to find ways to cut public spending.
Jones has claimed the government’s plan to set up this new body came after Liz Truss’ mini-budget.
The chair of this body, David Goldstone, will be paid £950 for one day’s work a week. Jones defended Goldstone’s salary on LBC saying: “The rate of return for the improvements that we will make from looking at these areas of spending will be far, far greater.”
He added: “It is right that we pay people for their time. We can’t expect people to work for free. That is an important way in which we do things in this country. Actually, the day rate for David is, on a benchmark basis, competitive.”