Emergency budget: Labour reactions

By Mark Ferguson / @markfergusonuk

As George Osborne finished swinging his axe today in one of the harshest budgets for years, Labour figures have been reacting to the budget – and trying to outline the impacts of the cuts.

UPDATE: Harriet Harman has emailed the Labour Party email list tonight, saying “George Osborne delivered a Budget that will throw people out of work, hold back economic growth and damage the public services we all rely on.”

Read Harriet’s email here.

The Labour Party has also produced the following stark message on today’s budget from Osborne et al:

UPDATE: In an interview with Andrew Marr just a month ago, David Cameron said a VAT rise was “not something we plan to do”. It was pretty clear, however, that Cameron didn’t mean what he said. He immediately backtracked, saying “you’ll have to wait for the budget.”

Here’s the whole transcript:

ANDREW MARR: Outside observers seem to say that it is, in the words of one, “an arithmetical certainty” that you’re going to have to raise VAT to 20%.

DAVID CAMERON: Well we’ve said before the election, during the election, and I’m happy to say now you know we believe that spending should bear the brunt of the burden …

ANDREW MARR: (over) I’ll come onto spending in a minute. In terms of tax.

DAVID CAMERON: (over) In terms of dealing, in terms of dealing with the deficit, we believe and we’ve put in our coalition agreement that you know the proportion of tax versus spend is pretty close to what we were arguing for in the election. So that’s not something that we plan to do.

UPDATE: Shadow Chancellor Alistair Darling has criticised the decline in growth forecasts – and the knock on effects for unemployment. Speaking to BBC News, Darling said:

“I am concerned that it’s forecasting that growth is going to be lower this year and next and extremely concerned that it’s showing that there will be more people out of work than we were forecasting.”

UPDATE: In an email to supporters, Ed Miliband has also said this is “judgement week for Liberal Democrats”. Miliband is inviting supporters to email Nick Clegg and Simon Hughes, saying “collusion” in this budget is “a betrayal of the causes you pledged to fight for during the election campaign.”

Ed Miliband has attacked the coalition on rising unemployment. Speaking to BBC news, he said that:

“The government’s own figures today say that it’s going to put up unemployment by 60,000 and lead to a hundred thousand less people in work every year of the forecast period in the coming few years.”

Jack Straw said today’s budget was optional rather than emergency. He also said that:

“Liberal Democrats are …. providing a human shield for the Conservatives to pursue a very clear, right wing and ideological policy, and this is an optional policy, we did not have to do it in this way.”

Yvette Cooper attacked cuts made for ideological reasons. Appearing on Sky News this afternoon Cooper said:

“This is really bad news for jobs, it’s also bad news for the economy. Some of these changes will affect the poorest people in the country.They’ve chosen extra cuts for ideological reasons.”

Speaking to Sky News, Diane Abbott attacked the Lib Dems, saying that they “bottled it” and that, “The only thing they got out if it is cheaper cider.”

On the budget itself, Abbott said, “It’s a regressive budget… VAT is a regressive tax.”

Ed Balls described it as “unemployment budget” and that “VAT rise and spending cuts mean unemployment forecast will be 100,000 a year higher.” Balls has also ramped up his “VAT bombshell” campaign in light of today’s announcement.

David Miliband meanwhile labelled todays events as, “A give with one hand punch with the other Budget.” He alleged that “The whole of corp tax cut is paid for by hit on investment allowances for business”, and returning to an attack line he used on Sunday, he described the “Remarkable transformation of Clegg from dumb waiter to nodding dog.”

Speaking in the commons, acting-leader Harriet Harman gave a vehement defence of Labour’s record, and passionately railed against the damage that this budget will do to the economy:

“Today’s budget is bad for growth and that will make it harder to cut the deficit. They have revised growth down for next year because of the harm this budget will do.”

“They say there is no alternative but the truth is this is what they want. This budget is not driven by economics, but by ideology – their commitment to a smaller state.”