More than any other stance, it was Jeremy Corbyn’s opposition to austerity that won him the Labour leadership. After their anger at Ed Miliband’s refusal to reject spending cuts, activists embraced Corbyn’s red-blooded alternative. Having initially accepted George Osborne’s fiscal charter, committing the goverrnment to acheiving a budget surplus by 2019/20, shadow chancellor John McDonnell has since been clear in his rejection of austerity.
In the last parliament, Miliband and Ed Balls disappointed many on the left by opposing most of the government’s cuts before conceding that they would be unable to reverse them if elected. A report in yesterday’s Observer suggested that McDonnell would avoid following this path. The shadow chancellor was reported to be planning a “fiscal credibility rule” that would “guarantee that all cuts announced for this parliament could be reversed in full”.
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