Labour Health Secretary Wes Streeting has refused to divulge details about the upcoming Autumn budget, telling GB News he “values his kneecaps”.
In an interview on The Camilla Tominey show hosted by Christopher Hope, Streeting admitted he was unaware of Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ decisions on tax matters, as she keeps such information closely guarded until near the budget announcement.
Wes Streeting was pressed for details
GB News
Streeting said: “I genuinely don’t know what decisions the Chancellor has made or is making about tax because she doesn’t share those until much closer to the budget.”
“And I’m not going to speculate because I value my kneecaps. And the Chancellor won’t tolerate me going around speculating about her budget.”
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“We were very clear in our manifesto no increases in income tax, National Insurance or VAT on working people,” he stated. “And we will keep those promises.”
Discussing Labour’s cautious approach to campaign pledges. He explained: “We were deliberately cautious because we knew that the public finances were in a state. In fact, they’re even worse than we expected.”
Streeting assured voters that Labour would honour their manifesto commitments: “We wanted to make sure that the promises we made were promises we could keep and the country can afford.
“And despite the challenges we’ve walked into, I can tell you we will honour every single one of those manifesto commitments.”
Despite his reluctance to speculate on budget details, Streeting gave a strong indication that income tax thresholds might be frozen.
This potential freeze could extend the current freeze until 2030, two years beyond the previous Conservative Government’s plan.
Such a move would result in more people being pushed into higher tax brackets as their wages increase with inflation.
Streeting acknowledged the difficult decisions ahead, stating: “The chancellor and the whole Government are going to have to make difficult and big choices in this budget to stabilise and fix the foundations of our country so we can build a better future.”
Labour has consistently pledged not to increase income tax, national insurance, or VAT for working people
GB News
However, the Health Secretary did not rule out potential changes to employer National Insurance contributions.
When questioned about this, he said: “I don’t know if that’s going to be in the budget, but we did not rule out that or a number of other things.”
He told Sky News: “We can’t fix 14 years in one Budget. So this is a process of priorities, choices and trade-offs.”
