Reform by-election candidate described Nigel Farage’s economic plans as ‘utterly toxic combination’
The Reform candidate in the upcoming Westminster by-election once described his party’s economic plans as “a completely toxic combination”.
In a post on LinkedIn three years ago, Matt Goodwin said he “cannot emphasize enough how UNPOPULAR it is to lower taxes and cut spending on public services.”
The former academic described it as “a totally toxic combination”, pointing to polling in the highly respected British Social Attitudes study that showed reducing both was supported by just 6 per cent of the public.
In November Nigel Farage said his party would “cut spending” and “we want to cut taxes”. Last month, he doubled down on this view, saying, “We will reduce excessive government spending.”
Mr Goodwin hit the headlines last week Independent He warned of a looming “fertility crisis” and called for a “biological reality” check on women and young girls.
This publication also revealed that he had previously suggested that extra taxes should be imposed as a penalty on people who had not had children, and warned that “many women in Britain are having children too late”.
The poll cited by Mr Goodwin, who is for Reform UK in by-elections in Gorton and Denton later this month, showed more than 50 per cent of people want taxes and spending to rise, while 40 per cent want them to stay the same.
In a speech last year, Mr Farage said “significant tax cuts” were currently unrealistic “given the poor state” of the country’s finances, but said his party would raise the threshold at which workers start paying tax and scrap Labour’s “family farm” inheritance tax changes.
However, he backed away from his party’s £90 billion tax cut promise in the 2024 elections; Leading economic think tank the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) said Reform had failed to set out how they would achieve this.
Last month Mr Farage also told an event in Davos that he thought: “The big lesson from the Liz Truss-Kwasi Kwarteng Budget is that they do not propose to cut spending. So for our program to work, what we absolutely need to tell people is that we will reduce welfare spending, we will reduce excessive government spending.”
A Labor spokesman said: “Matt Goodwin’s comments show that it is not just Labor that says Reformation’s economic plans are ridiculous – its own candidates think so too.
“Reform UK offers nothing but a return to austerity enacted by a party full of the same Conservatives who are destroying our public services.”
A Reform spokesman said: Independent: “Labour’s campaign in Gorton and Denton must be really going south if they had to resort to Matt’s poll analysis from three years ago when the economy was in a very different place.
“We will not learn from a party under whose watch the economy collapsed. By voting for Reform, Gorton and Denton voters can deliver Keir Starmer and help end this failed Labor government.”
