Sir Keir Starmer has been accused of being too scared to sack Chancellor Rachel Reeves despite her bungled handling of the economy.
Westminster is awash with rumours that a reshuffle is imminent with Cabinet Ministers including Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson and Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy said to be in line to lose their jobs.
But the biggest question is whether the Chancellor will be replaced, following dire growth figures and criticism of her decisions to means-test winter fuel payments and increase National Insurance.
However, a former Chancellor says Sir Keir would not dare to sack Ms Reeves.
Kwasi Kwarteng said Sir Keir would not remove his Chancellor because that would make the Prime Minister’s own position less secure – and could lead to him being forced out of Number 10.
Mr Kwarteng told GB News: “I don’t think there’s any way [Keir Starmer] is going to get rid of her, because we know that if you get rid of your Chancellor and you’re the Prime Minister, they’re going to come after you next.
“I’ve lived that, so I don’t think that’s going to happen.
“And then the other question I would ask is that there’s no other Labour MP that would do anything differently. And we can say, ‘Oh, Rachel Reeves, she can be the scapegoat.’
“But if she were replaced tomorrow by Wes Streeting or whoever, they would do exactly the same thing.”
Mr Kwarteng should know. The Conservative politician was sacked as Chancellor by former Prime Minister Liz Truss in October 2022 following the disastrous “mini budget” which caused chaos on financial markets.
But Ms Truss was forced to resign herself less than two weeks later.
Figures earlier this week confirmed that the economy is varely growing, with gross domestic product up 0.1% between October and December.
It was slightly better than expected as analysts and the Bank of England had expected the economy to shrink in the quarter. However Shadow chancellor Mel Stride said Ms Reeves’ budget was “killing growth” and working people and businesses were “already paying for her choices”.
It follows zero growth in the previous three months, which had led to fears that the UK was on the brink of recession.
Britain’s independent forecaster, the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR), is expected to reveal downgrades to growth forecasts in the spring statement on March 26, which it has reportedly warned the Chancellor this will wipe out her £10 billion “headroom” — spare money against its spending plans.
This will put Ms Reeves under pressure to cut spending or even resort to potential tax rises to keep her on track with fiscal rules, according to economists.
