The Guardian view on Treasury fiscal rules: no way to run a country | Editorial

Instead of sticking to arbitrary limits, politicians should be able to make the case for spending on urgent social repair

The UK has had seven sets of fiscal rules since 2010. In a study comparing it with 34 peer nations since 1985, Britain not only changed its rules more frequently but they also had shorter lives. Clearly fiscal rules are not immutable laws of nature but arbitrary, human-made restraints. Implicit in this model is a dim view of human nature: that politicians cannot be trusted to resist the temptation to abuse government spending programmes for political or ideological ends. The result is that, instead of a political leadership that spends too much, Britain has politicians who spend too little.

This is no way to run a country when there is urgent social repair needed. Instead, on Wednesday, Jeremy Hunt appears ready to deliver a budget full of tax giveaways and cuts to struggling public services to meet his fiscal rules. Labour should offer an alternative. Unfortunately, the shadow chancellor, Rachel Reeves, echoed Mr Hunt’s narrative and ditched the party’s flagship £28bn green investment pledge.

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from The Guardian https://ift.tt/OqlAa2X

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