Traders in the City of London were punching the air at Kwasi Kwarteng’s mini-budget last week. It was small wonder. He had granted some of them hundreds of thousands of pounds. By way of contrast, “red wall” Tory MPs’ hearts were sinking. Kwarteng’s new tax measures might have had one aim in view: to benefit London’s economy at the expense of the rest of the country. His former boss Boris Johnson’s one sensible policy ambition, to reduce the income gap between the capital and the north, lay in ruins. London was exulting.
The surge in bankers’ bonuses and the slashed rate for the richest 5% in the UK will go overwhelmingly to residents of the capital and its environs. The £45bn package is aimed at the wealthy, at corporate profits and at boosting the price of land and the private housing market. Of the 48 English enterprise zones to enjoy Treasury largesse, just 16 are in the north.
