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Nigel Farage is preparing to abandon any claim to be helping working-class people, with an announcement that Reform UK is axing plans to cut taxes.
Instead it will concentrate on cutting public spending (which always attacks the low-paid/people with little money) and axe Net Zero policies (to appease its fossil fuel corporation funders, who provide 92 per cent of its funding).
The Guardian tells us:
The party cannot deliver the £90bn in tax cuts promised in its manifesto.
Farage has previously said he expected to make £350bn worth of spending cuts over the course of the parliament – the equivalent of axing the whole schools budget every year or wiping out a third of NHS funding annually.
He has said he would find the savings via cuts to net zero, migrant hotels and diversity initiatives, but added the target figure was also widely expected to be revised.
Policies in the manifesto included raising the inheritance tax threshold to £2m, lifting the income tax personal allowance to £20,000 and the higher rate to £70,000 and reducing corporation tax to 15%. It also included tax relief on private school fees and cuts to fuel duty.
A Labour spokesperson said Reform’s economic plans were “built on sand”.
“Farage continues to flirt with Liz Truss’s economy-crashing unfunded pledges – which would leave family finances at risk. Working people simply cannot trust Reform. They offer anger but no answers,” the spokesperson said.
The Institute for Fiscal Studies has previously said the sums in Reform UK’s 2024 manifesto were implausible. “Regardless of the pros and cons of shrinking the state, or of any of their specific measures, the package as a whole is problematic,” it said. “Spending reductions would save less than stated, and the tax cuts would cost more than stated, by a margin of tens of billions of pounds per year.”
The Conservative shadow chancellor, Mel Stride, said the plans were “all over the place … Reform stood on a platform last year of huge unfunded commitments which would have wrecked the public finances. They cannot be trusted to run our economy.
“It’s Corbynism in a different colour – undeliverable, uncosted, and totally detached from reality. Britain needs a serious and honest plan to live within our means, support wealth creators and grow the economy.”
It’s… what?
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Stride wasn’t wrong to attack Reform for rowing back on its plan, but the “Corbynism in a different colour” line is a false equivalence that borders on self-satire.
It’s like mistaking a hedge fund for a food bank because they both handle money – or, if you prefer your arguments more finely-tuned, it conflates redistributive social policy with populist fiscal retreat in a way that insults both logic and legacy.
“Corbynism” evokes a left-wing, socialist agenda of increased public spending, nationalisation, wealth redistribution and so on.
Reform UK is instead pivoting toward spending cuts and deregulation. The only commonality is nice-sounding largesse (tax cuts), but the direction is opposite: Corbynism promises more public services funded by taxes; Reform is promising fewer services via cuts. So the analogy is more rhetorical smear than structural comparison.
The real comparison should be: who benefits, who loses, and how.
Corbyn-style policies arguably skew toward redistribution to lower- and middle-incomes; Reform’s earlier promises skew heavily upward (cuts to corporation tax, raising higher-rate thresholds). Stride’s framing obscures the fact that Reform’s policies are, by design, more favourable to high earners and asset holders.
And the numbers don’t add up. The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) has already pointed out major holes and optimistic assumptions in Reform’s costings. Stride’s shot doesn’t address that.
Historical lessons and risk parallels
A better parallel is with the 2022 Liz Truss mini-budget fiasco: unfunded tax cuts leading to market turbulence, interest rate spikes, and collapse in investor confidence.
Many analysts are already warning that Reform’s proposals echo these dangers.
The risk of macroeconomic shock, bond-market volatility, and funding pressure is real — especially for a party that claims it will cut borrowing for day-to-day spending.
A sharper analysis
The IFS analysis of the changes is much better than Strides – casting shade in his abilities as a shadow chancellor. Its critique of the 2024 Reform manifesto already flagged that the tax cuts would cost more than claimed, while the “savings” from spending cuts were overoptimistic.
For example, the proposed corporation tax cut to 15 per cent is under-costed; official estimates suggest it would cost far more.
Reform’s proposed “efficiencies” or “waste reductions” of £50 billion+ is vague and unlikely to materialise without damaging core services.
The party also plans to extract “interest on QE reserves” or other technical banking measures to raise revenue — these are speculative and contested.
And once they abandon the tax cuts, their credibility becomes precarious: promise without delivery will hurt trust.
Reversal of commitments undermines political trust
Let’s expand on that last point: parties that publicly abandon pledges risk being seen as opportunistic flip-floppers. This signals weak internal discipline or a lack of seriousness.
And the transition from promising huge tax cuts to focusing on spending cuts and scrapping net-zero also suggests that Reform is responding to pressure from markets, creditors, or backers — not to the needs of constituents.
Disproportionate harm to low-income and vulnerable groups
Cutting public spending tends to fall hardest on services on which low-income people rely – health, social care, housing, local government.
Any blanket “cuts” mantra must be interrogated: which services are spared, which are gutted? How many jobs will go? At what service cost? Efficiency claims are often cosmetic; real cuts hit front-line staff and essential services.
Abandoning net-zero policies is not just a climate issue — it’s an equity issue: climate degradation, pollution, health burdens, and extreme weather disproportionately hurt poorer communities.
Alignment with funders / interest groups
We know that 92 per cent of Reform’s funding comes from fossil-fuel–adjacent corporate sources, so is this clientelism? Is Reform pandering to its donors (big energy, big business) rather than to the working-class electorate.
Also, many of these shifts (tax cuts, deregulation, scrapping climate rules) open up opportunities for rent-seeking, regulatory capture, and enrichment of elites.
A litany of excuses
Reform’s deputy leader, Richard Tice, has said the party can’t deliver tax cuts until spending has been brought under control, but that means the tax cut was a lure, not a guarantee.
And the deeper question is: why should working-class voters continue to trust in tax cuts if they never materialize?
Reform might also say that net-zero and climate regulation are onerous burdens on business and growth. But many clean-tech industries are growing, and energy transition is a global driver of innovation.
Climate investment yields jobs and savings (energy efficiency, lower carbon costs), and abandoning net-zero imposes hidden costs (pollution, health, climate risk).
The illusion fades
For years, Farage has thrived on a particular illusion: that railing against elites somehow made him the champion of the “ordinary” voter.
But when the policies are laid bare, the mask slips.
Every move Reform UK now makes — from abandoning tax cuts to promising sweeping spending reductions — shifts the burden downward, onto the people it claimed to represent.
We’re not watching a rebellion against the establishment, but a reshuffle within it: a party funded by corporate money, dismantling public protections, and calling the wreckage “freedom”.
The working class will not be liberated by a government that guts their schools, hospitals and councils while deregulating the industries that profit from their poverty.
Farage’s promise to “change the way government functions” is less a revolution than a clearance sale — selling off the state, cutting loose public accountability, and handing the proceeds to the already powerful.
The rhetoric may be populist, but the economics are pure plutocracy.
So when Reform’s leaders next claim to stand for “the people”, remember this moment – because this was the day that, by their own admission, they stopped pretending.
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Farage is preparing to kill Reform UK’s ‘party of the people’ claims – dead
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Instead it will concentrate on cutting public spending (which always attacks the low-paid/people with little money) and axe Net Zero policies (to appease its fossil fuel corporation funders, who provide 92 per cent of its funding).
The Guardian tells us:
It’s… what?
Support Vox Political!
With social media algorithms acting as gatekeepers – allowing users to read only what their owners want them to, sites like Vox Political need the support of our readers like never before.
You can help by making a donation:
https://Ko-fi.com/voxpolitical
Stride wasn’t wrong to attack Reform for rowing back on its plan, but the “Corbynism in a different colour” line is a false equivalence that borders on self-satire.
It’s like mistaking a hedge fund for a food bank because they both handle money – or, if you prefer your arguments more finely-tuned, it conflates redistributive social policy with populist fiscal retreat in a way that insults both logic and legacy.
“Corbynism” evokes a left-wing, socialist agenda of increased public spending, nationalisation, wealth redistribution and so on.
Reform UK is instead pivoting toward spending cuts and deregulation. The only commonality is nice-sounding largesse (tax cuts), but the direction is opposite: Corbynism promises more public services funded by taxes; Reform is promising fewer services via cuts. So the analogy is more rhetorical smear than structural comparison.
The real comparison should be: who benefits, who loses, and how.
Corbyn-style policies arguably skew toward redistribution to lower- and middle-incomes; Reform’s earlier promises skew heavily upward (cuts to corporation tax, raising higher-rate thresholds). Stride’s framing obscures the fact that Reform’s policies are, by design, more favourable to high earners and asset holders.
And the numbers don’t add up. The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) has already pointed out major holes and optimistic assumptions in Reform’s costings. Stride’s shot doesn’t address that.
Historical lessons and risk parallels
A better parallel is with the 2022 Liz Truss mini-budget fiasco: unfunded tax cuts leading to market turbulence, interest rate spikes, and collapse in investor confidence.
Many analysts are already warning that Reform’s proposals echo these dangers.
The risk of macroeconomic shock, bond-market volatility, and funding pressure is real — especially for a party that claims it will cut borrowing for day-to-day spending.
A sharper analysis
The IFS analysis of the changes is much better than Strides – casting shade in his abilities as a shadow chancellor. Its critique of the 2024 Reform manifesto already flagged that the tax cuts would cost more than claimed, while the “savings” from spending cuts were overoptimistic.
For example, the proposed corporation tax cut to 15 per cent is under-costed; official estimates suggest it would cost far more.
Reform’s proposed “efficiencies” or “waste reductions” of £50 billion+ is vague and unlikely to materialise without damaging core services.
The party also plans to extract “interest on QE reserves” or other technical banking measures to raise revenue — these are speculative and contested.
And once they abandon the tax cuts, their credibility becomes precarious: promise without delivery will hurt trust.
Reversal of commitments undermines political trust
Let’s expand on that last point: parties that publicly abandon pledges risk being seen as opportunistic flip-floppers. This signals weak internal discipline or a lack of seriousness.
And the transition from promising huge tax cuts to focusing on spending cuts and scrapping net-zero also suggests that Reform is responding to pressure from markets, creditors, or backers — not to the needs of constituents.
Disproportionate harm to low-income and vulnerable groups
Cutting public spending tends to fall hardest on services on which low-income people rely – health, social care, housing, local government.
Any blanket “cuts” mantra must be interrogated: which services are spared, which are gutted? How many jobs will go? At what service cost? Efficiency claims are often cosmetic; real cuts hit front-line staff and essential services.
Abandoning net-zero policies is not just a climate issue — it’s an equity issue: climate degradation, pollution, health burdens, and extreme weather disproportionately hurt poorer communities.
Alignment with funders / interest groups
We know that 92 per cent of Reform’s funding comes from fossil-fuel–adjacent corporate sources, so is this clientelism? Is Reform pandering to its donors (big energy, big business) rather than to the working-class electorate.
Also, many of these shifts (tax cuts, deregulation, scrapping climate rules) open up opportunities for rent-seeking, regulatory capture, and enrichment of elites.
A litany of excuses
Reform’s deputy leader, Richard Tice, has said the party can’t deliver tax cuts until spending has been brought under control, but that means the tax cut was a lure, not a guarantee.
And the deeper question is: why should working-class voters continue to trust in tax cuts if they never materialize?
Reform might also say that net-zero and climate regulation are onerous burdens on business and growth. But many clean-tech industries are growing, and energy transition is a global driver of innovation.
Climate investment yields jobs and savings (energy efficiency, lower carbon costs), and abandoning net-zero imposes hidden costs (pollution, health, climate risk).
The illusion fades
For years, Farage has thrived on a particular illusion: that railing against elites somehow made him the champion of the “ordinary” voter.
But when the policies are laid bare, the mask slips.
Every move Reform UK now makes — from abandoning tax cuts to promising sweeping spending reductions — shifts the burden downward, onto the people it claimed to represent.
We’re not watching a rebellion against the establishment, but a reshuffle within it: a party funded by corporate money, dismantling public protections, and calling the wreckage “freedom”.
The working class will not be liberated by a government that guts their schools, hospitals and councils while deregulating the industries that profit from their poverty.
Farage’s promise to “change the way government functions” is less a revolution than a clearance sale — selling off the state, cutting loose public accountability, and handing the proceeds to the already powerful.
The rhetoric may be populist, but the economics are pure plutocracy.
So when Reform’s leaders next claim to stand for “the people”, remember this moment – because this was the day that, by their own admission, they stopped pretending.
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