You can only conclude that Conservative MPs are just too trusting for their own good. Either that or they are catatonically dim. The rest of us know enough to not always believe what we read on the front page of the rightwing papers, but Tory MPs seem to take everything at face value. If it’s in the paper, it must be true. It’s almost touching.
Tuesday’s front pages of the Mail and the Telegraph insisted Rachel Reeves’s time was up. Going to China while the international bond markets crept upwards was the last straw. The chancellor should resign. What’s more, the prime minister had expressed his “full confidence” in Reeves, which could only mean that he was about to sack her. Let’s just say that Monday had been a slow news day in Westminster and some hacks had decided to make mischief.
But for Tory MPs, Reeves’s departure was clearly a done deal. So they all headed off to the Commons in the expectation that the chancellor would do the decent thing. They would call for her to go and she would duly oblige. As I said, there’s no accounting for stupidity. After 14 years of government, they’ve forgotten how being in opposition works. Then again, they were used to changing the prime minister and cabinet at regular intervals, so they probably thought Labour would operate in the same way.
Not that Reeves was totally out of the woods. A chancellor doesn’t get to choose her inheritance and hers had been worse than most. And it was fair to say her budget hadn’t exactly thrilled business leaders who had been primed for growth. But she was a long way from getting sacked after just six months as a result of economic forces that were largely out of her control. And just to make sure, she came to the chamber with a phalanx of ministerial supporters. Though not Tulip Siddiq, who hadn’t been seen for days. There’s a woman whose job really was on the line.
“Not engaging with China is not an option,” Reeves began. Her delivery slightly garbled. You could sense the nerves as she tried to talk up her trip. This wasn’t how she had envisioned spending her Tuesday lunchtime when she was suffering from jet lag. But best to take the initiative and hope the Tories imploded.
She didn’t have long to wait.
It’s not clear if even Mel Stride thinks he has what it takes to do the job of chancellor. In a generally underwhelming shadow cabinet – there’s no one in there who you would trust to feed your dog – the Melster is the most forgettable. There is no obvious sign of recognition when he catches his reflection in the mirror and his only redeeming virtue is a loyalty that masks a lack of intelligence. He was the last member of Rishi Sunak’s team who was prepared to go out and say everything was just fine when his world was crumbling around him.
What’s most endearing about Stride is that he has no real idea of just how half-witted he is. So rather than get up and evaluate Reeves’s performance as chancellor, he merely demanded that she resigned. Borrowing rates were at their highest since the financial crash and growth was nonexistent. Facts not totally unconnected to global forces and 14 years of Tory government.
But this was by the by. Reeves had to go. “We, on this side, know how this sorry story goes,” he said, to loud laughter from the Labour benches. Well, yes. Stride ended with some botched Hamlet gag. To go or not to go. Even the Melster seemed to realise he had lost his audience long ago. This was an opposition in name only. The Tories weren’t a credible government in waiting and he was just a joke as shadow chancellor.
All this was music to Reeves’s ears. Any remaining nerves were gone and she grew in confidence. The rest of the statement belonged to her. The economy might not be how she would have wanted it but her position was secure. “He’s not serious,” she declared delightedly. I could have told her that. She went on to observe that the Tories and the Lib Dems were fine with Labour’s spending commitments but weren’t prepared to make the tax rises to pay for them. Then there was always the Liz Truss put-down. She knew a thing or two about crashing an economy.
Cue any number of Labour MPs lining up to express their deepest love for Rachel. It’s amazing what the thought of Pat McFadden as chancellor can do to you. A man who has never had an optimistic thought in his life. A man after my own heart. As for the Tories, they just looked crushed. The best they could come up with was that the £600m investment was chicken feed.
That just left Reform’s Richard Tice – the jaundiced 1980s Littlewoods catalogue model – to present his credentials as chancellor in waiting. Reform are polling significantly higher than the Tories, so it’s not an impossibility. Although it is a terrifying thought. Dicky’s small fortune was largely acquired by starting with a large one. With him in charge, the UK would be heading out of the G20 in a matter of years.
Earlier in the day, Robert Jenrick had been granted an urgent question on the use of drones to deliver drugs, phones and weapons to prisoners. As ever with Honest Bob, it wasn’t clear he realised this niche service had thrived under his own government. You can’t move outside Wandsworth nick or Wormwood Scrubs without someone flying a drone over the wall. Amazon could learn a thing or two.
