Kwasi Kwarteng refused on Thursday to rule out another humiliating U-turn - this time on corporation tax - and stressed he was not about to quit as Chancellor.
Speaking to reporters at an economic summit in Washington, the Chancellor was asked if he was going to U-turn on further big measures announced in his fiscal statement on September 23, having already climbed down on his plan to axe the 45p top rate of income tax.
Mr Kwarteng responded: “Our position has not changed.
“I will come up with the medium-term fiscal plan on October 31, there will be more detail then.”
Pressed again if there was a possibility that he would row back on his decision not to go ahead with a previously announced increase in corporation tax from 19p to 25p, he said: “What I’m totally focused on is delivering on the mini-budget, making sure that we get growth back into our economy.”
Asked about reports that officials in No10 were discussing filleting the mini-budget, Mr Kwarteng said: “I speak to No10, to the Prime Minister all the time, we are totally focused on delivering the growth plan.”
Amid a febrile mood at Westminster, he was asked if he would be Chancellor and Liz Truss Prime Minister this time next month, to which he responded: “Absolutely, 100 per cent, I’m not going anywhere.”
Mr Kwarteng said his talks with the International Monetary Fund had illustrated that "growth is a central focus of the international community" and the Government was "quite right to focus on growth".
The Chancellor and PM are under pressure to U-turn over key parts of the mini-budget to help restore confidence in the Government's economic plans.
Ms Truss's leadership already was being questioned after just over a month in the job forcing Foreign Secretary James Cleverly to issue a warning to plotting Tory MPs.
Downing Street insisted there were no plans for further changes to the budget package.
But the financial markets appear to be expecting further moves to ditch elements of the tax-cutting measures in order to demonstrate a commitment to balancing the books.
The mini-budget's plan to increase borrowing to fund tax cuts caused turmoil on the financial markets and the pound plunged against the dollar.
Tory poll ratings also plummeted and eventually led to Mr Kwarteng abandoning plans to scrap the 45p rate of income tax for top earners.
But reports suggested talks are under way between No 10 and the Treasury on abandoning other elements of the £43 billion tax-cutting plan, including the commitment to axe a planned increase in corporation tax.
The managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said it is sometimes right for a "recalibration" of policies.
Speaking at a press conference in Washington, Kristalina Georgieva said: "Our message to everybody, not just the UK, is that at this time, fiscal policy should not undermine monetary policy."
She added that "it is correct to be led by the evidence, so if the evidence is that there has to be a recalibration, it's right for governments to do so".
Ms Georgieva also confirmed IMF leaders have had a "constructive" meeting with Mr Kwarteng after the institution's chief economist said the UK Government's tax cuts threatened to cause "problems" for the British economy.
The scale of the backlash to the mini-budget has led to speculation that the Prime Minister's position could be in jeopardy.
At a hostile meeting of the backbench 1922 Committee in Westminster on Wednesday, Commons Education Committee chairman Robert Halfon told Ms Truss she had "trashed the last 10 years of workers' Conservatism".
Meanwhile, the editor of the influential ConservativeHome website, Paul Goodman, suggested there was talk of replacing Ms Truss with a joint ticket involving her former leadership rivals Rishi Sunak and Penny Mordaunt.
But Mr Cleverly told the BBC: "We have got to recognise that we do need to bring certainty to the markets.
"I think changing the leadership would be a disastrously bad idea politically and also economically.
"We are absolutely going to stay focused on growing the economy."
