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This allegation carries significant weight: suggesting Rachel Reeves has lied to the British public, frightening them to accept massive extra taxes that could be spent on higher welfare payments. While exaggerated, this is not usual political sparring; on this occasion, the stakes are more serious. A week ago, detractors aimed at Reeves alongside Keir Starmer were labeling their budget "a mess". Now, it is branded as falsehoods, and Kemi Badenoch calling for the chancellor to quit.

This grave accusation requires clear responses, therefore let me provide my view. Did the chancellor lied? Based on the available information, apparently not. She told no major untruths. But, despite Starmer's recent remarks, that doesn't mean there is nothing to see and we should move on. Reeves did mislead the public regarding the considerations informing her decisions. Was this all to channel cash towards "benefits street", as the Tories assert? No, as the figures prove this.

A Standing Sustains Another Hit, But Facts Must Win Out

Reeves has taken a further hit to her standing, but, if facts still matter in politics, Badenoch should stand down her attack dogs. Maybe the stepping down yesterday of the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) chief, Richard Hughes, due to the leak of its own documents will satisfy SW1's appetite for scandal.

Yet the true narrative is much more unusual than media reports indicate, extending broader and deeper than the careers of Starmer and the 2024 intake. Fundamentally, herein lies an account concerning what degree of influence you and I get in the running of the nation. This should should worry you.

Firstly, to the Core Details

When the OBR released last Friday some of the forecasts it shared with Reeves as she wrote the budget, the shock was immediate. Not merely had the OBR never done such a thing before (an "unusual step"), its numbers apparently contradicted the chancellor's words. Even as leaks from Westminster were about how bleak the budget would have to be, the OBR's own forecasts were improving.

Consider the Treasury's so-called "iron-clad" fiscal rule, that by 2030 day-to-day spending on hospitals, schools, and the rest would be completely funded by taxes: in late October, the OBR reckoned this would barely be met, albeit only by a tiny margin.

Several days later, Reeves gave a media briefing so extraordinary that it caused morning television to break from its regular schedule. Several weeks prior to the actual budget, the nation was warned: taxes were going up, with the primary cause cited as pessimistic numbers from the OBR, in particular its conclusion suggesting the UK was less productive, putting more in but yielding less.

And so! It happened. Despite the implications from Telegraph editorials combined with Tory broadcast rounds suggested over the weekend, this is basically what transpired during the budget, which was big and painful and bleak.

The Deceptive Alibi

Where Reeves deceived us concerned her alibi, because those OBR forecasts did not compel her actions. She could have chosen other choices; she could have provided alternative explanations, even on budget day itself. Prior to the recent election, Starmer promised precisely this kind of people power. "The hope of democracy. The strength of the vote. The potential for national renewal."

One year later, yet it is powerlessness that jumps out in Reeves's pre-budget speech. Our first Labour chancellor in 15 years portrays herself as a technocrat at the mercy of factors outside her influence: "Given the circumstances of the persistent challenges on our productivity … any chancellor of any party would be standing here today, confronting the decisions that I face."

She did make decisions, just not the kind the Labour party wishes to broadcast. Starting April 2029 British workers and businesses are set to be paying another £26bn a year in taxes – but the majority of this will not be funding improved healthcare, public services, nor happier lives. Whatever bilge is spouted by Nigel Farage, Badenoch and others, it isn't getting splashed on "welfare claimants".

Where the Cash Actually Ends Up

Rather than being spent, more than 50% of this additional revenue will in fact give Reeves cushion for her self-imposed fiscal rules. About 25% goes on paying for the administration's policy reversals. Examining the OBR's calculations and giving maximum benefit of the doubt to a Labour chancellor, a mere 17% of the taxes will go on genuinely additional spending, for example scrapping the two-child cap on child benefit. Its abolition "costs" the Treasury a mere £2.5bn, because it had long been an act of political theatre by George Osborne. This administration could and should have binned it in its first 100 days.

The Real Target: Financial Institutions

The Tories, Reform and all of right-wing media have been barking about how Reeves fits the caricature of left-wing finance ministers, taxing hard workers to fund shirkers. Party MPs are applauding her budget for being balm to their social concerns, protecting the disadvantaged. Both sides are completely mistaken: The Chancellor's budget was largely aimed at asset managers, hedge funds and participants within the financial markets.

Downing Street can make a strong case in its defence. The forecasts from the OBR were deemed too small to feel secure, especially considering bond investors demand from the UK the greatest borrowing cost of all G7 rich countries – exceeding that of France, which lost a prime minister, higher than Japan which has way more debt. Combined with our policies to cap fuel bills, prescription charges and train fares, Starmer together with Reeves can say this budget allows the central bank to cut its key lending rate.

You can see that those folk with red rosettes may choose not to couch it this way next time they visit #Labourdoorstep. According to a consultant to Downing Street says, Reeves has "utilised" financial markets to act as a tool of discipline over Labour MPs and the voters. It's the reason the chancellor cannot resign, no matter what pledges are broken. It's why Labour MPs will have to knuckle down and vote to take billions off social security, as Starmer promised recently.

A Lack of Statecraft and a Broken Pledge

What is absent from this is any sense of strategic governance, of harnessing the Treasury and the Bank to reach a fresh understanding with markets. Also absent is intuitive knowledge of voters,