Kwasi Kwarteng ‘rewrites budget turmoil history’ after claims he warned Liz Truss about tax cuts
Kwasi Kwarteng ‘rewrites history on budget turmoil’ as former Chancellor claims he warned former Prime Minister Liz Truss about their tax cut plans
- Kwasi Kwarteng said he warned Liz Truss about the mini budget
- However, allies of Ms Truss say the former chancellor is ‘rewriting history’
- Mr Kwarteng made no apology for the financial turmoil caused by tax cuts
Allies of Liz Truss yesterday accused Kwasi Kwarteng of “rewriting history” after he claimed he had warned her that she was going too far and too fast with her radical economic reforms.
The former chancellor said he had urged the then prime minister to “take it easy” in the wake of the September mini-budget that triggered her downfall.
Mr Kwarteng acknowledged that he had “some responsibility” for the mini-budget timetable, which had frightened financial markets, but said Ms. Truss was “very much of the opinion that we had to act quickly”.
“Even after the mini-budget we went very fast,” he told TalkTV on Thursday. And I said, “You know, we need to slow down.” And she said, “Well, I only have two years,” and I said, “If you keep going like this, you’ve got two months.”‘
Kwasi Kwarteng said in an interview that he warned Liz Truss that she was going too far and too fast with her radical economic reforms.
However, Ms Truss’s allies say Kwarteng is ‘rewriting history’ and he is ‘fully signed up’ for the mini-budget
But an ally of the former prime minister said yesterday that Mr Kwarteng’s version of events is “not true”. They said, “There is some serious rewriting of history going on here. He was fully signed up for the mini budget. After that, no further action was taken except reverting parts of it – there was nothing to delay.’
Another ally pointed out that Mr Kwarteng brushed aside market concerns about the mini-budget at the time, even giving a television interview two days later, boasting that there was “more to come” on tax cuts. “If anyone pushed to go faster, it was him,” the source said.
Kwarteng declined to apologize for the financial turmoil caused by the mini-budget, but acknowledged “there was unrest and I regret that.” He said the “strategic goal was right,” but “we should have had a much more measured approach.”