Portsmouth Labour MP calls on Conservative government to cancel 'kamikaze budget'

Labour MP for Portsmouth South, Stephen Morgan, has called upon the Conservative government to reverse the mini-budget announced by chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng last month.

Following Mr Kwarteng’s initial announcement of the budget, including the planned increase in national insurance being scrapped, the value of the pound plummeted against the US dollar.

The proposed cut to the top rate of income tax has already been reversed, and now Mr Morgan has joined other Labour MPs in pushing for the entire mini-budget to be u-turned.

He said: ‘Liz Truss needs to reverse her government's kamikaze budget and abandon their discredited, dangerous trickle-down approach.

‘Portsmouth needs practical support this winter, not warm words about a backward economic ideology that is running our country into the ground.

‘If the UK continues with the same level of growth it has seen for the last decade, Poland will be richer than Britain in about 12 years' time – only Labour can deliver the stable economy that Portsmouth and the UK so desperately need.’

Along with the pound’s value dropping, mortgages have risen and many lenders are refusing to offer new mortgage deals.

Shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves MP said: ‘This is a Tory crisis that has been made in Downing Street, and that is being paid for by working people.

‘Families worried sick about bills haven’t even had so much as an apology from the prime minister or chancellor, the architects of chaos unleashed on the British economy and family finances.’