Writing in this week's Bromsgrove Advertiser (December 01st), Bradley said:
“Last week, the Chancellor attempted to present the Budget as a bold plan to rebuild Britain, but when we strip away the rhetoric, we don’t see a plan for the future, we see a blueprint for decline.
For months before the Budget, the Government attempted to scare the country into believing tax rises were a necessity. Now we know the Government lied about the state of the finances, making them appear worse than they actually are in order to lay the groundwork for tax rises.
Last year, the Chancellor raised taxes by £40 billion and promised that she would not be coming back for more. Yet here we are, one year on, with another £26 billion tax raid.
Credibility matters. When promises are broken so quickly, trust evaporates, and my constituents feel that betrayal directly.
Families who believed the Chancellor’s assurances on tax will now find themselves paying more tax, with less money left at the end of each month.
The first duty of any Budget is to foster growth, yet all the indicators all point in the wrong direction. Inflation is up, with food inflation at nearly 5%, so families in Bromsgrove and the Villages are paying more for their weekly shop. Taxes are up, and the OBR has confirmed that the UK’s tax burden is at a record high, with it projected to reach 38.3% of GDP by 2030. This means you’re working longer hours, only to see more of your pay taken away.
Economic growth is also down, with GDP growing by just 0.1% in Q3 of this year. We’re not seeing the economic growth the Government promised you last year – and we’re not going to in the years to come.
Instead, what we’re seeing is stagnation. Stagnation in wages, stagnation in opportunity and stagnation in hope.
This is Labour’s economic scoreboard: inflation is up, taxes are up, unemployment is up, spending is up, borrowing is up, confidence is down and economic growth is down. That’s not rebuilding Britain; it’s dismantling Britain’s prosperity, and we’re all paying the price.
Two thirds of the British public now say that they want to see spending cuts. I know many of you are tightening your belts, and so you rightly expect the Government to do the same and to live within their means, yet Labour’s Budget expands spending recklessly.
This is a Budget that is unsustainable, unfair and damaging to the very foundations of our economy. Most importantly, it’s bad for all of us who work hard and do the right thing.”
