Mel Stride: Voters will get everything from Reeves today – except the truth

Sir Mel Stride is Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer.

Today, Rachel Reeves will stand up and deliver Labour’s first Spending Review since taking office. Expect a torrent of promises. Expect spreadsheets, slogans, and self-congratulation.

But what you won’t hear is the truth: Labour is spending money it doesn’t have, with no plan to pay for it. That means more borrowing, more debt, and – come the Autumn Budget – more tax rises as well.

Labour are addicted to borrowing. Since coming into office, Reeves has deliberately loosened the fiscal rules, cooked the books, and ramped up borrowing by over £30bn a year – all while claiming she’s restoring “stability”. It’s a line even her own backbenchers are struggling to deliver with a straight face.

Government borrowing is running well above even the forecasts set out in March – and for the last financial year it came out 70 per cent higher than the plans left in the final Conservative budget. That’s not because of global headwinds or unforeseen shocks. It’s because Labour is making the wrong choices – maxing out the national credit card, and hoping no one notices.

They think the public won’t care. They think fiddling the fiscal rules and changing definitions of debt will mask the consequences. But the consequences are already here. The cost of servicing that debt is soaring. Over £100bn a year is now spent on interest payments alone – more than on schools, defence, or policing. That’s taxpayers’ money down the drain, every single year, because Labour can’t control itself.

Let’s remember, in March, Reeves delivered an “emergency Budget.” She claimed it was a response to circumstances outside her control. But that’s not true. This is a crisis of Labour’s own making. The £40bn in tax rises she introduced have smothered growth. Business investment is stalling, and confidence is weakening.

Now, Reeves wants us to believe she can afford £300bn of new spending without either borrowing more or taxing more. The reality is she will end up doing both.

The Treasury now has an unfunded £1.25bn commitment on Winter Fuel Payments and is refusing to say how this will be resolved. Ministers are poised to reverse other policies such as the two-child benefit cap, at a potential cost of a further £3.5bn – and they haven’t even factored tariffs into their budget forecasts. Having left herself hardly any headroom for meeting her fiscal rules, the Chancellor is handing out money she doesn’t have.

Reform UK has no better grasp of how to make the numbers add up than the Chancellor does. Their pitch is simple. Big spending, big tax cuts, no trade-offs. Their economics make Jeremy Corbyn’s look grounded. They promise the world, but their plans are built on sand; an uncosted wishlist, powered by imaginary savings and fantasy growth figures. At least Labour pretends to care about the rules. Reform don’t even bother.

Our party has learned hard lessons. The mini Budget of 2022 undermined the stable foundations we had built, and we will never allow that to happen again. We acted swiftly to restore stability. But rebuilding trust takes time – and honesty. That’s why we now offer something no other party will – realism, discipline, and stability.

Don’t get me wrong, our economy has been underperforming for a long time. As I set out in my speech on the economy last week, we have to completely rewire our economy so it is delivering for working people and we can get taxes down. But that has to be done through a credible, fully costed plan. We need a bit of ‘responsible radicalism’.

If I were delivering today’s Spending Review, I would start by levelling with the public. There are no easy answers. We cannot borrow and tax our way to growth. We cannot fund everything everyone wants without hard choices. And we cannot put off radical economic reform forever.

We would take a different path. We would rebuild our fiscal buffers, control public spending, and reform welfare to get people into work – not trap them in dependency. We would pursue efficiency in Whitehall, not throw money at every problem. And we would back growth the right way: through stable, pro-business policies, not tax raids and regulatory uncertainty.

Reeves talks about “hard choices”, but in reality, Labour have chosen the easy road: more spending, more borrowing, more risk. And they’ve done so knowing that when the next shock hits, Britain will have no margin left to act.

So yes, today’s Spending Review will be full of promises. But it is the spend today, tax tomorrow spending review. And Britain simply can’t afford it.

Labour don’t just need a Spending Review. They need a reality check. And the public deserve a serious alternative – one that puts responsibility before rhetoric and outcomes before optics.

That’s what the Conservative Party will offer. No gimmicks. No fantasy economics. Just a clear plan to restore stability, unlock growth, and deliver for the British people. Let Labour and Reform compete in the populist arms race.

We will take the responsible road – because we know that’s the only path to a stronger future.