Jeremy Hunt: Budget will be ‘prudent and responsible’

Ahead of Wednesday’s Budget, Chancellor Jeremy Hunt gave an interview on Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg in which he tried to manage expectations regarding potential tax cuts. Without mentioning any specific details, he said the ‘most unconservative’ thing he could do would be to lower taxes by borrowing more. However, Hunt did hint there might be some form of cut, arguing that the economies growing fastest globally are those with lower taxes, and suggesting he wanted to ‘show a path in that direction’.

Will Hunt ‘steal’ Labour’s non-dom tax policy?

Kuenssberg asked Jeremy Hunt about the expectation that he might both cut national insurance, and adopt Labour’s plan to tighten up the rules around non-dom tax status. She also questioned whether Hunt might now disagree with his own statement in 2022 that he would rather non-doms stayed in the country and ‘spent their money here’. Hunt refused to talk about any specific taxes, and would not comment on his earlier statement. The Chancellor said the government would not do ‘gimmicks’ on Wednesday, and that he wanted to bring down the tax burden in a responsible way. Meanwhile, over on Sky News, Labour’s Bridget Phillipson suggested it would be an ‘abject humiliation’ for the government if they adopted Labour’s non-dom tax policy.

Bridget Phillipson: government’s childcare plan will not be delivered

With the first rollout of the government’s free extra childcare hours supposedly beginning in April, Jeremy Hunt told Laura Kuenssberg that he was ‘confident’ the programme was on track. However, he declined to give an ‘absolute guarantee’, saying it was a ‘huge change’. Shadow Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson said the government had rushed the plan out, and there was ‘no way to make it happen’. Phillipson spoke of Labour’s plans for breakfast clubs in primary schools, and said early years education and childcare would be her number one priority if elected, but would not give any details on how many free childcare hours Labour would promise.

Phillipson ‘deeply regrets’ Rochdale election

The controversial George Galloway was elected as Rochdale MP this week, with Labour pulling support from Azhar Ali after he repeated conspiracy theories about Hamas’ October 7th attack. Kuenssberg asked Bridget Phillipson if she was worried such an outcome could happen again in other Labour seats. Phillipson said she was confident Labour would have a strong candidate in place for the general election, and that she didn’t want to see ‘hatred or division in any community’.

Which extremist groups was Rishi Sunak referring to?

Finally, Rishi Sunak gave a speech outside 10 Downing Street on Friday after George Galloway’s election victory in which he said extremism, specifically mentioning Islamist groups and the far-right, was a growing threat to British democracy. On Sky News this morning, Trevor Phillips asked Jeremy Hunt if he could mention specifically any groups that were hijacking the protest marches. Hunt repeatedly said he could not mention specific names, but said we had ‘all seen the scenes on our television.’ Hunt said the ‘British way is tolerance’, and that some Jewish people were terrified to leave their houses because of the behaviour of ‘a small minority.’ Phillips argued that without naming specific groups, it was implied that either everyone on the marches, or all Muslims, were responsible for ‘crossing the line’.