RACHEL Reeves has likened herself to Margaret Thatcher amid a week of economic turbulence as she said there is no alternative to the policies she is pursuing.
The Chancellor has been under increasing pressure this week due to rising borrowing costs and sluggish economic growth, but she has adamantly told the BBC she is in her job for the “long haul”.
There had been growing speculation about whether she would be ousted as chancellor, but Reeves said she is qualified for the position and has the ideas to turn things around despite mounting fears the economy is heading for a period of increased inflation with no growth.
Reeves told the BBC’s Political Thinking podcast on Friday that she was “happy” to be known as the Iron Chancellor – an apparent reference to Margaret Thatcher’s nickname as the Iron Lady.
She told Nick Robinson, the host of the BBC podcast, that she hasn’t taken the criticism personally and that it’s all “political”.
“Some people don’t want me to succeed. Some people don’t want this government to succeed. That’s fair enough. That’s their prerogative. But I’m not going to let them get me down,” Reeves said.
When pressed by Robinson on whether her decisions to raise national insurance for employers had caused business confidence to dip, Reeves defended her choice, by saying: “What was the alternative?”
She added: “Of course, all decisions have consequences.
“But imagine the alternative. Imagine that I hadn’t addressed that problem. And now when financial markets look at the UK, they would be saying this is a government that is not real about the situation that it faces. It is spending more money than it is bringing in. It’s having to borrow more and more.”
Reeves was then asked if she was happy to be portrayed as an “iron chancellor” to which she said: “If people want to describe me as that.
“I will make the right decisions. I’m happy to be the iron chancellor, if that’s what you want to call me,” she said.
Reeves has been considering deeper cuts to public spending as she is in danger of breaking her self-imposed fiscal rules.
She refused to rule out spending cuts as she came under fire from all sides in the Commons on Tuesday.
An internal letter from Number 11 about the Chancellor’s spending review was revealed by the Telegraph earlier this week where the Treasury said “difficult” decisions on budgets will be needed.
The letter from Darren Jones, the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, was sent to cabinet ministers in December and detailed that “success will require ruthless prioritisation” of public spending.
