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This allegation carries significant weight: suggesting Rachel Reeves may have deceived UK citizens, scaring them to accept billions in additional taxes that would be spent on higher benefits. However exaggerated, this isn't typical Westminster bickering; this time, the stakes could be damaging. A week ago, critics aimed at Reeves alongside Keir Starmer were calling their budget "a mess". Now, it's denounced as falsehoods, with Kemi Badenoch demanding the chancellor to quit.

Such a grave accusation requires straightforward responses, so let me provide my view. Did the chancellor tell lies? On the available information, apparently not. She told no blatant falsehoods. But, despite Starmer's yesterday's comments, it doesn't follow that there's no issue here and we can all move along. Reeves did misinform the public regarding the considerations informing her decisions. Was this all to funnel cash towards "benefits street", like the Tories claim? Certainly not, as the figures demonstrate it.

A Reputation Sustains Another Hit, But Facts Must Win Out

Reeves has taken a further hit to her standing, but, if facts continue to have anything to do with politics, Badenoch ought to stand down her attack dogs. Perhaps the resignation recently of the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) chief, Richard Hughes, due to the leak of its internal documents will quench Westminster's thirst for blood.

Yet the true narrative is far stranger compared to the headlines indicate, and stretches wider and further than the careers of Starmer and the 2024 intake. At its heart, herein lies an account concerning what degree of influence you and I get over the running of the nation. This should concern everyone.

First, on to the Core Details

After the OBR released last Friday some of the forecasts it provided to Reeves as she wrote the red book, the shock was immediate. Not merely had the OBR not done such a thing before (an "exceptional move"), its numbers seemingly contradicted Reeves's statements. Even as rumors from Westminster were about the grim nature of the budget would have to be, the OBR's own forecasts were getting better.

Take the Treasury's most "unbreakable" fiscal rule, that by 2030 daily spending for hospitals, schools, and other services would be wholly paid for by taxes: in late 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. Weeks prior to the real budget, the country was put on alert: taxes would rise, with the main reason being gloomy numbers provided by the OBR, in particular its finding that the UK had become less productive, putting more in but getting less out.

And lo! It happened. Notwithstanding the implications from Telegraph editorials and Tory media appearances suggested recently, that is essentially what transpired during the budget, which was big and painful and bleak.

The Misleading Alibi

Where Reeves deceived us concerned her alibi, because these OBR forecasts didn't compel her actions. She might have made different options; she might have given alternative explanations, even on budget day itself. Prior to last year's election, Starmer promised exactly such public influence. "The hope of democracy. The power of the vote. The possibility for national renewal."

A year on, and it's a lack of agency that jumps out from Reeves's pre-budget speech. Our first Labour chancellor in 15 years portrays herself to be an apolitical figure buffeted by factors outside her influence: "Given the circumstances of the persistent challenges on our productivity … any chancellor of any political stripe would be standing here today, facing the decisions that I face."

She certainly make decisions, only not the kind the Labour party cares to broadcast. Starting April 2029 UK workers and businesses are set to be contributing an additional £26bn annually in tax – and most of that will not be spent on better hospitals, new libraries, nor enhanced wellbeing. Regardless of what bilge is spouted by Nigel Farage, Badenoch and their allies, it is not getting splashed on "welfare claimants".

Where the Money Really Goes

Instead of going on services, over 50% of the additional revenue will instead provide Reeves cushion for her own budgetary constraints. Approximately 25% is allocated to paying for the administration's U-turns. Reviewing the OBR's calculations and giving maximum benefit of the doubt to a Labour chancellor, a mere 17% of the tax take will go on genuinely additional spending, such as scrapping the limit on child benefit. Its abolition "will cost" the Treasury only £2.5bn, because it had long been a bit of theatrical cruelty from George Osborne. This administration could and should abolished it immediately upon taking office.

The Real Target: The Bond Markets

Conservatives, Reform and all of right-wing media have spent days railing against how Reeves conforms to the stereotype of left-wing finance ministers, taxing hard workers to spend on shirkers. Party MPs have been applauding her budget as balm for their social concerns, safeguarding the most vulnerable. Both sides could be 180-degrees wrong: Reeves's budget was primarily targeted towards asset managers, speculative capital and participants within the financial markets.

The government could present a strong case in its defence. The margins from the OBR were insufficient to feel secure, especially given that bond investors charge the UK the highest interest rate among G7 rich countries – exceeding that of France, that recently lost its leader, higher than Japan which has way more debt. Coupled with our measures to cap fuel bills, prescription charges and train fares, Starmer and Reeves can say their plan enables the Bank of England to cut interest rates.

It's understandable that those folk with red rosettes might not couch it this way next time they visit the doorstep. As one independent adviser to Downing Street says, Reeves has "weaponised" financial markets as an instrument of discipline against her own party and the electorate. It's the reason Reeves cannot resign, no matter what promises are broken. It is also why Labour MPs must knuckle down and support measures to take billions off social security, just as Starmer promised yesterday.

A Lack of Political Vision , an Unfulfilled Promise

What's missing from this is the notion of statecraft, of mobilising the finance ministry and the central bank to reach a new accommodation with markets. Missing too is intuitive knowledge of voters,