World of Politics with Harry McGee

KamaKwasi; as headlines go it was, well ‘puntastic’ – a clever play on the name of Kwasi Kwarteng, the British chancellor of the Exchequer.  Last week, Kwarteng announced a mini-budget, with some very generous (verging on reckless) spending measures announced, including a cap on energy bills which some commentators believe is like writing a blank cheque.

The measure that caused furore, though, was a cut to the top rate of tax from 45 per cent to 40. They went down like a lead balloon among the public.

Those that would benefit from it were the richest people in Britain, those earning six figure salaries each year. It would be worth an extra £50,000 a year to someone earning £1 million, in other words somebody who did not really need it.

“We are in the beginning of a new era,” he announced on the day of the mini-budget. The new era lasted little over a week.

The pound began to plummet and markets got jittery. With fears being voiced of a run on the pound, the Bank of England intervened to shore up sterling to the tune of £65 billion. That’s a big wad of cash in anybody’s language.

In the run-up to the Tory party conference in Birmingham at the weekend, Kwarteng and the British Prime Minister Liz Truss stuck by their guns.

On Sunday morning she was interviewed by the BBC and said there would be no reverse on the tax cut. The most interesting part of it was that she disclosed that it was Kwarteng himself who came up with the plan. In other words, she was in denial mode.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.

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