Winter and discontent arrived across Britain this morning.
As snow swept the nation, furious farmers vented their anger at the Labour government as part of an incredible 10,000-strong protest.
Retailers warned of “inevitable” job losses, price hikes and shop closures while pensioners lashed out at “disgusting” cuts to winter fuel payment.
We’re not quite at 1970s levels yet but there is a growing sense that Sir Keir Starmer is dragging the country kicking and screaming towards a modern day Winter of Discontent.
The sheen from his party’s General Election triumph has quickly turned corrosive.
Labour’s bombshell tax-rising Budget is the culprit, punishing millions of Britons under the ruse that a £22 billion needs to be filled.
The Prime Minister and his Chancellor Rachel Reeves claim the only way to do this is to drive up taxes.
Farmers have warned that the government’s inheritance tax changes are a “stab in the back”.
Jeremy Clarkson, who joined thousands of farmers protesting at the changes in Westminster, urged the government to “back down”.
This creates a major headache for the Prime Minister, who is currently 6,000 miles away at the G20 Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
Public opinion is largely in favour of farmers and Clarkson is a massively popular and influential figure.
Another headache, perhaps an even bigger one, for Sir Keir is the reaction by retailers to the Budget.
Tesco, Amazon, Greggs, Next, and dozens of other chains are urging the Treasury to reconsider some of the measures announced in last month’s Budget.
They have warned High Street job losses are on the way, prices will rise, and shops will be forced to close.
Reeves’s triple-whammy of hikes to National Insurance and the National Living Wage while slashing business rate relief are largely to blame.
And then there’s Labour’s “cruel” decision to snatch away the winter fuel payment, a decision which has provoked the wrath of millions of pensioners.
This was compounded by forecasts that energy bills are set to rise to £145 a month in January, the coldest month of the year.
Just four months into this new Labour government and Winter and discontent has arrived early.
