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Labour’s conference in Liverpool has revealed a party with an apparent split-personality disorder.

The UK’s government seems to be struggling to manage two competing identities at once – and to reconcile two conflicting messages.

Ministers are insisting that they are driven by a moral mission — protecting children, tackling poverty, and ensuring fairness — while simultaneously insisting they must make tough, sometimes unpopular, economic choices that undermine the same goals.

I could demonstrate with any subject, but top of the list has to be child poverty: Treasury Select Committee chair Dame Meg Hillier repeatedly stressed that scrapping the two-child benefit cap is both morally right and economically sensible.

Hillier told a fringe meeting, “If we lift the cap, that’s 350,000 children immediately out of poverty and, crucially, 700,000 out of deep poverty in one fell swoop.”

But Chancellor Rachel Reeves has insisted that the numbers must add up, hinting that lifting the cap is estimated to cost £3.5 billion annually and will require hard decisions elsewhere – a line that undercuts the moral imperative she frames around child welfare.

In reality, Reeves is wrong and Hillier is right – because experts say lifting the two-child cap will bring around £7 billion into the economy. Here’s how:

The New Economics Foundation estimates that abolishing the cap would cut the economic cost of child poverty by £3.2 billion a year by the end of this parliament. That’s because poverty drives higher spending on health, social services, housing support, and crisis interventions.

Removing the cap would immediately raise the incomes of low‑income families by around £1.9 billion in 2025/26, rising to £2.6 billion by 2029/30. Families on the lowest incomes tend to spend extra money locally and quickly, which has a strong multiplier effect on the economy.

NEF analysis suggests scrapping the cap would generate an additional £1.1 billion of economic growth in 2025/26 alone. Over time, higher earnings and spending would return more money to the Treasury through taxation.

Researchers from the London School of Economics argue that investment in children has one of the highest payoffs of any public spending, because healthier, better‑educated children become more productive adults. In other words, lifting the cap is not just welfare but an investment in human capital.

The biggest gains would be in poorer regions (for example Birmingham, Bradford, Bolton), where families are disproportionately affected. That means more balanced growth across the UK.

So the two‑child cap is a false economy: it saves the Treasury money on paper in the short term, but increases poverty‑related costs, depresses local demand, and undermines long‑term growth. Lifting it would act as both an anti‑poverty measure and a pro‑growth policy.

Reeves is wrong and Hillier is right. But Reeves is the one with the power. Why doesn’t she do the right thing? Well, it’s either because she likes inflicting poverty on millions of people or because she is stupid. That’s what you get when you make someone from a bank’s complaints department the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

Energy policy offers another illustration of this contradiction. Labour MPs including Jo White, who spoke at the Transform to Beat Reform fringe, proposed retrofitting solar panels and heat pumps for pensioner homes, promising tangible benefits to working families.

But with energy bills continuing to rise despite government pledges of a £300 reduction by 2030, constituents are left sceptical.

White admitted, “That promise of a £300 reduction in bills is actually taking the mickey out of my constituents — I am ashamed that we keep repeating that answer.”

Here, the moral claim of helping families clashes with the reality of policy delivery, highlighting the party’s struggle to make its rhetoric match outcomes.

Immigration policy, too, demonstrates Labour’s conflicting approach.

Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood outlined tough conditions for migrants seeking indefinite leave to remain, including proving community contribution, learning English, and maintaining a clean criminal record. Mahmood justified this as necessary to preserve an “open, tolerant, generous country.”

Yet by making migrants prove their worth, the government risks alienating the very communities it claims to champion, while simultaneously reinforcing narratives of exclusion.

Starmer called Reform UK’s deportation plans “racist and immoral,” and Reeves echoed his remarks, but Labour’s own tightened rules mirror a similar logic: moral framing on one hand, hard restrictions on the other. See This Site’s previous article for more on this.

Even in tax and spending, the split is evident.

Reeves repeatedly promised to keep “taxes, inflation and interest rates as low as possible,” yet she has warned of “harder choices to come” in the November Budget due to global economic pressures. Analysts estimate Labour may face a £40-50 billion shortfall in public finances.

At the same time, the government has ruled out VAT on private healthcare, preserving a tax break for wealthier service users, while signalling it may need to increase other taxes.

And of course – as we’ve seen from the discussion of child-related benefits above – it is likely that these problems would disappear if Reeves were to release a little money into the economy instead of constantly trying to take it out. That one doesn’t seem to have the brains she was born with.

The media spotlight only amplifies the contradictions. During her conference speech, Reeves faced a pro-Palestinian protester and responded with a mixture of moral framing and government pragmatism: “We understand your cause and we are recognising a Palestinian state. But we are now a party in government, not a party of protest.” In that moment, the party’s twin identity — moral advocate versus managerial authority — was laid bare.

The repeated invocation of “renewal” and decency in Sir Keir Starmer’s conference speech – according to previews – illustrates the same tension. He is likely to tell delegates: “Britain stands at a fork in the road. We can choose decency, or we can choose division. Renewal or decline.”

But the government’s simultaneous acknowledgment of tough economic realities — tax rises, constrained budgets, and delayed benefit improvements — undermines the clarity of that moral narrative. Voters are left to reconcile lofty ideals with tangible hardship.

Labour’s attempt to be all things to all people is destroying its credibility.

From pointless pledges to reduce child poverty and cut energy costs to policies that impose strict conditions on migrants and hint at tax increases, the government’s mixed signals are turning us away.

Media scrutiny, direct quotes, and hard figures repeatedly expose the gap between rhetoric and reality.

In short, Labour’s claim to have a moral mission is compromised by it’s own myopia in governance.

By trying to sell decency simultaneously with “tough decisions” that actually make no sense, ministers have created a split personality that voters can see through.

The result is a conference that reveals a party with no point, no clear direction, and no coherent argument.

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