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The charge represents a grave matter: suggesting Rachel Reeves may have misled the British public, scaring them to accept billions in extra taxes that would be funneled into higher welfare payments. While exaggerated, this is not typical political sparring; this time, the stakes could be damaging. A week ago, detractors aimed at Reeves alongside Keir Starmer were calling their budget "a mess". Now, it is branded as falsehoods, and Kemi Badenoch calling for the chancellor to quit.

Such a serious accusation requires straightforward responses, so here is my assessment. Has the chancellor been dishonest? Based on current information, no. There were no whoppers. However, notwithstanding Starmer's yesterday's comments, it doesn't follow that there's no issue here and we should move on. The Chancellor did misinform the public about the considerations informing her decisions. Was this all to funnel cash to "welfare recipients", like the Tories claim? Certainly not, as the figures prove it.

A Reputation Sustains Another Blow, Yet Truth Must Win Out

The Chancellor has sustained a further blow to her standing, but, if facts continue to matter in politics, Badenoch should stand down her lynch mob. Maybe the resignation recently of the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) chief, Richard Hughes, due to the leak of its internal documents will satisfy SW1's thirst for blood.

But the true narrative is far stranger than the headlines indicate, extending broader and deeper beyond the careers of Starmer and the 2024 intake. At its heart, herein lies an account concerning what degree of influence the public get over the running of our own country. And it should worry everyone.

Firstly, to Brass Tacks

After the OBR published recently some of the forecasts it provided to Reeves while she wrote the red book, the shock was immediate. Not only has the OBR not done such a thing before (described as an "exceptional move"), its figures seemingly contradicted the chancellor's words. While rumors from Westminster were about the grim nature of the budget would have to be, the OBR's own predictions were getting better.

Take the Treasury's most "iron-clad" fiscal rule, stating by 2030 day-to-day spending on hospitals, schools, and the rest would be wholly paid for by taxes: at the end of October, the watchdog reckoned it would just about be met, albeit only by a minuscule margin.

Several days later, Reeves gave a press conference so extraordinary that it caused breakfast TV to interrupt its regular schedule. Several weeks before the actual budget, the nation was put on alert: taxes were going up, and the primary cause cited as gloomy numbers from the OBR, in particular its finding that the UK was less efficient, putting more in but getting less out.

And so! It came to pass. Despite what Telegraph editorials combined with Tory broadcast rounds suggested over the weekend, that is essentially what happened during the budget, that proved to be big and painful and bleak.

The Misleading Alibi

Where Reeves misled us concerned her alibi, since those OBR forecasts did not force her hand. She might have made other choices; she could have provided other reasons, including on budget day itself. Prior to last year's election, Starmer pledged precisely this kind of people power. "The hope of democracy. The power of the vote. The potential for national renewal."

One year later, and it is a lack of agency that is evident in Reeves's pre-budget speech. Our first Labour chancellor for a decade and a half portrays herself as a technocrat at the mercy of factors outside her influence: "Given the circumstances of the persistent challenges with our productivity … any chancellor of any political stripe would be standing here today, facing the choices that I face."

She certainly make a choice, just not one Labour wishes to publicize. From April 2029 British workers and businesses will be contributing an additional £26bn annually in tax – but the majority of this will not go towards spent on better hospitals, new libraries, nor enhanced wellbeing. Regardless of what nonsense comes from Nigel Farage, Badenoch and others, it isn't being lavished upon "benefits street".

Where the Money Really Goes

Rather than going on services, more than 50% of the additional revenue will instead provide Reeves a buffer against her own fiscal rules. About 25% goes on covering the government's own policy reversals. Examining the watchdog's figures and giving maximum benefit of the doubt towards Reeves, a mere 17% of the tax take will go on actual new spending, for example abolishing the two-child cap on child benefit. Its abolition "will cost" the Treasury only £2.5bn, because it had long been an act of theatrical cruelty from George Osborne. This administration should have abolished it immediately upon taking office.

The True Audience: The Bond Markets

Conservatives, Reform along with the entire right-wing media have spent days barking about the idea that Reeves fits the stereotype of Labour chancellors, taxing hard workers to fund the workshy. Party MPs have been applauding her budget for being balm for their troubled consciences, protecting the disadvantaged. Both sides could be 180-degrees wrong: The Chancellor's budget was largely aimed at asset managers, hedge funds and the others in the financial markets.

Downing Street could present a compelling argument for itself. The margins from the OBR were deemed insufficient to feel secure, particularly considering bond investors charge the UK the highest interest rate among G7 rich countries – higher than France, that recently 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 argue their plan enables the central bank to cut its key lending rate.

It's understandable that those wearing red rosettes might not couch it this way when they're on the doorstep. According to one independent adviser to Downing Street says, Reeves has "weaponised" financial markets as a tool of discipline against her own party and the voters. It's why the chancellor can't resign, no matter what promises are broken. It's the reason Labour MPs will have to knuckle down and vote that cut billions from social security, as Starmer indicated yesterday.

Missing Statecraft and an Unfulfilled Pledge

What is absent here is the notion of strategic governance, of harnessing the Treasury and the central bank to reach a fresh understanding with markets. Also absent is innate understanding of voters,