Rishi Sunak hints Government will ditch its own fiscal rules in Budget
2 min read
Rishi Sunak has heavily hinted the Government will ditch its own fiscal rules in this week’s Budget after repeatedly refusing to say he will stick to them.
The Chancellor declined to say he would follow the three principles laid out by his predecessor Sajid Javid, which effectively committed to not increase borrowing to fund day-to-day spending.
Instead he told BBC One's The Andrew Marr Show: "I believe very much in the importance of fiscal responsibility, about responsible management of our public finances.
"And as I've made the point before, it's because there's been very strong management of public finances over the last 10 years by successive Conservative chancellors who have made some difficult decisions that means I can sit here today and say I will invest what it takes to get us through this because our public finances are in a good spot."
Challenged multiple times if he would retain the existing fiscal rules, which were also in the Tory manifesto in December, he failed to confirm he would.
Mr Sunak replied: “It's because there's been very strong management of public finances over the last 10 years by successive Conservative chancellors, who have made some difficult decisions, that means I can sit here today and say I will invest what it what it takes to get through this, because our public finances are in a good spot.”
On the question of whether he remained committed to balancing the nation’s books over the next three years, he said: “You're asking me about the detail of what the budget contains which I can't give you until Wednesday.”
Mr Marr responded by saying: “All I'm asking you is whether you're going to stick by the clear three fiscal rules on which your government was elected only a few weeks ago, and if you can't say yes, people will assume the answer is no.”
And Mr Sunak replied: “Well, we have a budget on Wednesday.
"I could be asked many many questions about every single line item in the budget and I couldn't confirm or deny any single one of them.
“I’ve given you a very strong commitment, of course I will be fiscally responsible.”
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