Hunt gets tough on public spending

Liz Truss was in an apologetic mood again this morning when she sat down with her cabinet ministers. She told them that the government had ‘gone too far and too fast with the mini-Budget’ and that this had been, in the words of her spokesman, ‘exacerbated by global factors with inflation rising around the world’. 

Her opening remarks included a pledge to be ‘honest with the public that times would be tough but that by addressing long-standing issues now, we can put the country on a stronger path for the future’. One of the (myriad) problems Truss has had up to this point is a refusal to be honest about what choices she really needs to make. It is, though, possible that she has not been honest with herself, given the vehemence with which she said only last week that there would ‘absolutely’ not be public spending cuts.

The more important contribution to this morning’s meeting came from the new Chancellor Jeremy Hunt.