Tactless jokes and half-arsed platitudes made up chancellor’s vapid Tory conference speech
Photograph: Anadolu Agency/Getty ImagesPhotograph: Anadolu Agency/Getty Imagesot waving but drowning. Days like these are coming round with increasing frequency. Days when the sketch is little more than a transcription service. Days when there is no way to improve on the sheer madness of the Tory party. Its capacity for self-harm has become compulsive. An addiction almost. The only way mostcan reassure themselves they are in government is when they are surrounded by chaos.
Just after 7.30am, Kamikwasi appeared on BBC Breakfast. It felt more like a hostage video. The normally arrogant, over-confident facade had given way to fear. You could sense a man who was now out of his depth and was playing for time. Trying to wind down the clock with bluff. Everything was fine. Never better. Reinstating the 45p tax rate was no big deal. It was just a distraction, he said time and again. It wouldn’t affect the overall plan. Largely because there wasn’t one.
It was only a matter of time before he was gone. What credibility he had ever had, totally shredded. He may have reversed a tax giveaway to the rich, but there were still billions of pounds of other unfunded tax cuts. And just as important, he had shown his hand. He might have been forced into a humiliating climbdown, but now everyone knew he was completely relaxed about extra tax breaks for the most well off. The optics were shite either way. Though Kamikwasi was too dim to appreciate it.
He couldn’t bear to hear the truth. And now he’d finally had to bend just 10 days after delivering the mini-budget when reality became unavoidable. Was he going to apologise? He wasn’t. Though he would mutter something about humility and contrition. Those words were squeezed out through gritted teeth. His budget was all about growth, he insisted. Except as ever, Kamikwasi had missed the point. His budget was the exact opposite. Anti-growth. It could have been designed to make people worse off.
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