As Labour continues its inquest into the reasons for its local election losses, attention has focused on the pensioners’ winter fuel allowance and the changes in incapacity benefit. And in the past few days, there have been internal criticisms of the decision to delay the publication of its child poverty review.
But Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves have made the right call in delaying until the autumn. This new timetable means that the government is not only consulting widely, determined that Labour must never lose its reputation for fairness, but also considering how to fund the changes the child poverty review will propose – something only the budget can address. I know from my 10 years as chancellor that the public spending statement Reeves will deliver next month (which is not like a budget where tax and spending announcements are made together) will not be able to undo the scale of the damage done to the 4.5 million children in poverty – the ever-increasing victims of the long tail of Tory austerity.
