Part of Treasury – in the House of Commons at on 3 September 2024.
I thank my hon. Friend for his question. Upon taking office, as he says, we discovered a £22 billion black hole in the public finances that had been left by the previous Government, and we have now uncovered a litany of unfunded Conservative spending commitments. We recently learned that the deficit is now £4.7 billion higher than the OBR forecast in March because of the previous Government’s economic recklessness. We will rectify this, and we will set out a clear spending plan, and an ambitious plan to get the country back into stable economic conditions, at the Budget.