Rishi Sunak’s pledge to cut taxes is “the greatest fairytale,” a prominent ally of Liz Truss said as the two Conservative leadership campaigns clashed.
Senior minister Jacob Rees-Mogg criticised Sunak’s promise to cut the basic rate of income tax from 20p to 16p by 2029 with just over a month remaining before a new Tory leader and Prime Minister is announced. Former Chancellor Sunak is hoping to make up ground on Truss during a key week in the leadership contest, with a hustings on Monday night and three head-to-head clashes over the coming days.
As well as hustings on Wednesday and Friday, the two contenders to replace Boris Johnson will also face off in a Sky TV debate on Thursday. Sunak’s campaign had hoped his pledge to cut income tax would boost his chances as Tory Party members receive their postal votes.
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But Brexit Opportunities Minister Rees-Mogg told Sky News: “I think suggesting there will be income tax cuts many, many years into the future is the finest fantasy. Making suggestions that tax will be cut in the years to come is the greatest fairytale.”
He also highlighted Sunak’s key role in the Johnson administration which put up taxes to the highest level for 70 years to help cover the cost of dealing with the Covid-19 pandemic. Rees-Mogg told Times Radio: “That’s where his proposal to cut VAT by 5% on domestic fuel and get it to zero is so surprising, because he was very strongly opposing that when the Prime Minister was suggesting it.
“To then come up with it now is surprising, let’s just leave it at that.”
Former Cabinet minister Liam Fox, an ally of Sunak, defended the former Chancellor’s approach to the public finances and dismissed suggestions that his campaign is struggling. He told GB News: “You don’t borrow for tax cuts, you don’t max out on the country’s credit card today and leave it to the next generation, you make sure you’ve got the public finances sorted and then you give tax cuts which – as Mrs Thatcher said – have to be earned, not given.”
Sunak won the parliamentary stage of the Tory leadership contest but pollsters, pundits and bookmakers have suggested he is struggling to match Truss’ appeal with the Conservative members who will decide the next prime minister over the coming weeks. Dr Fox said: “The campaign is not tanking.
“If you look at the poll of actual Conservative councillors at the weekend there was a two-point gap, with 31% undecided. I think it’s the case that Tory Party members are a lot more circumspect than a lot of the London media expected them to be.”
Foreign Secretary Liz Truss’s latest major policy announcement is a plan to tackle “Whitehall waste” by cutting civil service salaries and reducing expenditure in an effort to save millions of pounds of public funds.
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