Liz Truss and Kwasi Kwarteng have gambled the country in the casino with huge tax cuts for the wealthy and big businesses funded by massive borrowing, Labour has claimed.
Shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves said that when Britain faces a cost-of-living crisis, soaring inflation and climbing interest rates the Prime Minister and Chancellor were like “two desperate gamblers in a casino chasing a losing run”.
Opposition parties were left staggered by Kwarteng’s announcement of multi-billion tax cuts for the rich and big companies in an emergency mini-budget.
Reeves said: “The argument peddled by the Chancellor today isn’t a great new idea or a game changer us much as they would like us to think so.
"What this plan adds up to is to keep corporation tax where it is today, and take national insurance contributions back to where they were in March. Some new plan.
"It is all based on an outdated ideology that says if we simply reward those who are already wealthy, the whole of society will benefit. They have decided to replace levelling up with trickle down."
The SNP said the Tory government is “robbing the poor to pay the rich” after the Chancellor after the Chancellor announced ordinary taxpayers will foot the bill for the energy company bail out and multi-billion pound tax breaks for big business and high earners.
In the Commons the SNP’s Alison Thewliss MP said the measures announced “do not go anywhere near far enough” to help low and middle income families and small businesses.
Thewliss said: “It’s shameful that the Tory government is increasing energy prices again to £2,500 instead of introducing a real freeze on bills.
“Many households will be paying double what they paid last year. Worse still, the Tories are robbing the poor to pay the rich by forcing taxpayers to foot the bill for this energy company bail out - and for the multi-billion pound tax breaks they are giving to big business and high earners."
The SNP Treasury spokeswoman added: “The Tory Chancellor is a reverse Robin Hood - taking billions of pounds away from ordinary families, small businesses and our NHS, and handing it over to the richest people and biggest businesses in the UK.
“After a decade of Tory cuts and Brexit damage, the UK already had the worst poverty and inequality in north west Europe - before energy bills began to rise. Now millions of families will be pushed further into hardship and saddled with billions in public debt.”
The pound dropped to a fresh 37-year-low against the dollar as the Chancellor unveiled his “growth plan” for the UK economy.
Sterling declined by 0.89% to 1.115 US dollars, meaning it has shed 17% against the US currency so far this year.
It comes after Bank of England launched another 0.5 percentage point interest rate hike to 2.25% on Thursday and warned the UK could already be in a recession.
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