Peter Lamb MP: A week of resetting British politics

After months of stories suggesting major Budget cuts, what emerged was instead a Budget which not only avoided such cuts, but which delivered greater spending in key areas such as the NHS and a programme of capital investment to rebuild the nation’s shattered infrastructure and secure the economic growth the country desperately needs to improve households incomes and generate revenue for public services.

Achieving this did involve increasing taxes, but as promised taxes there were no direct increases in taxes on working people and only the wealthiest decile of society has on average lost more than they gained from the Budget, those presenting this as an average on all of us rather than a tax on those with the broadest shoulders are doing so dishonestly.

While the Conservatives did elect their sixth leader in eight years, it doesn’t appear to have delivered the reset the party needed. The public generally gives parties a boost in the polls when they appoint a new leader. Even so, leaders have just a short window of time to make it clear to voters who they are and what they stand for.

So, it was surprising to see that rather than setting out a positive vision for the country or attacking the government, Kemi Badenoch instead used her first full day in the role to make the argument that the Conservatives’ lockdown parties weren’t that bad.

Even after a campaign in which she made Trump-like statements, that maternity leave should not exist and that she would like to see thousands of civil servants imprisoned, to make a statement so obviously at odds with public opinion highlights a poor grasp of what the country is thinking and very poor judgement.

No doubt this still represents a reset of a kind, only one moving the Conservatives even further away from the British public.