Labour's Phoney Promises.

The Labour Party tells us that it will increase social spending on schools and hospitals, if elected to government, but - at the same time - reduce public sector borrowing and do this without increasing income tax, national insurance, VAT or corporation tax. Nor will it introduce a wealth tax. It has made ambiguous noises about capital gains tax (CGT).

A Party committed to redistribution of income and wealth from the rich to the poor, and reducing economic inequality, could not countenance increasing indirect taxes, which are regressive, and hurt the poor more than the rich. However, nor could it continue with the two-child child benefit cap, as it plans to do.

The only way that Labour's fiscal arithmetic makes any sense is on the basis of extremely optimistic assumptions about economic growth, well above current projections, and indeed the long-term trend growth-rate of 2% p.a.

Rachel Reeves' boast that she will, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, achieve the "fastest rate of (economic) growth in the G7" is fanciful, not to mention exceptionalist, nonsense, particularly given that Labour plan to keep Britain out of the Single Market, and refuse to contemplate the restoration of freedom of movement. The tinkering at the margins with the Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA), which is their alternative, will not provide anything like the boost to GDP they will need.

The voters are, in short, being offered a proverbial "pig in a poke" - but, after fourteen years of Tory misrule, they seem all-too-ready to buy it. It is to be hoped that the tantalising prospect that the Liberal Democrats might just end up as the second largest Party, and Sir Ed Davey the Leader of the Opposition (see Peter Kellner's blog, 17th June) proves to be correct, no matter how small the chance may be.