Have faith in me, says Reeves, in battle with Reform – Daily Business

Chancellor Rachel Reeves today issued a call for the Labour party and the country at large to have faith in her strategy, promising that it will deliver growth and an improvement in public services.

Her speech to the annual conference was laced with a list of Labour’s first year achievements – mainly investment pledges – countering Reform’s claim that Labour has been a seamless continuation of the Conservative government.

Seven times she said: “Don’t let anyone tell you there is no difference between a Labour government and a Conservative government.”

Mindful of Reform’s surge in the polls, she warned: “The single greatest threat to our way of life and to the living standards of working people is the agenda of Nigel Farage and the Reform Party.   

“Whatever falsehoods they push, whatever easy answers they peddle, however willing they are to tear communities and families apart – they are not on the side of working people,” she claimed. 

She listed employment rights, economic stability, trading deals with the UK’s closest partners and standing up for the NHS as issues which distinguished Labour from Reform.

“On every issue it is Labour that is standing up for working people and our national interest,” she declared.

“That is the fight that we must win and it is a fight we will win.”

Her key theme was the need to stick to her fiscal rules which would underpin the ability to grow the economy and finance public finances.

“No one said it was going to be easy.  But take pride in what we are achieving, together,” she said. “Not just pride in winning, but pride too in the choices we are making and the lives we are changing.”

With a veiled dig at those within her party – including leadership pretender Andy Burnham – who want her to borrow more to spend more, she added: “I said that we must not, and would not, take risks with Britain’s economic stability, that argument was not just for an election. 

“Even now, with the global uncertainty we have seen ripple through financial markets, there are still critics out there who would too readily forget the consequences of reckless economic choices.”

She said that £1 in every £10 is spent on financing debt interest. “That is not how I want to spend public money,” she said.

Her attention has turned to “a renewed economy for a renewed Britain”, she said, noting that this had begun investments across the country in rail roads, airports and energy infrastructure.

“A renewed economy that supports investment, that gets inflation and borrowing down, and where we build growth in every part of Britain.

“And whatever tests come our way, whatever tests come my way, I make this commitment to you: I will take no risks with the trust placed in us by the British people.”

Highlighting the £150 billion of investment coming into the UK from the US alone, she said she had never believed the Tory mantra that the best thing a government can do is get out of the way.

She said Labour would run the economy differently but no one said it would be easy.

“A strong economy must rest on strong foundations,” she said. “I call that approach ‘securonomics’ and mentioned the support given to key industries, including steel and shipbuilding.

“There is further to go.  But whatever tests confront us, have faith because our party and our country have overcome greater challenges than these.  

“Have faith, because the opportunity to serve is what we came into this for.” 

She accused the Tories of handing out Covid contracts to their “cronies”, and announced that £400 million lost to Covid fraud has been recovered. She pledged to continue the fight to recover ore.

“In the coming months we are bringing in new powers to recover more money from fraudster who have ripped off the government and our public services,” she said. “We are recruiting a new hit squad … because we want our money back.”

She confirmed her pledge to “abolish long-term youth unemployment” through a new scheme underwritten by the government.

Every young person who has been on Universal Credit for 18 months without earning or learning will be offered paid work through the Youth Guarantee.