A future Conservative government would save £47 billion of taxpayers’ money by cutting spending on welfare, aid and social housing, the shadow chancellor will claim on Monday.
Sir Mel Stride is expected to set out proposals to slash Government spending when he addresses the Conservative Party conference, saying the country cannot “keep spending money we simply do not have”.
Some £23 billion is expected to come from cuts to welfare, replacing payments to people with “low level” mental health conditions with treatment and barring non-citizens from claiming support among other reforms.
Sir Mel is also set to commit his party to reversing any change to the two-child benefit cap, widely expected to be in line for abolition at next month’s Budget.
Promising to “never, ever make fiscal commitments without spelling out exactly how they will be paid for”, Sir Mel will say: “We’re the only party that gets it. The only party that will stand up for fiscal responsibility.
“We must get on top of government spending. We cannot deliver stability unless we live within our means.”
He will commit his party to cutting Civil Service numbers by around a quarter, saving £8 billion, and reducing aid spending by £7 billion to 0.1% of national income.
Under David Cameron, the Tories introduced a target of spending 0.7% of national income on overseas aid, which was reduced to 0.5% following the pandemic and then cut again by the current Labour Government to 0.3% to pay for greater defence spending.
The Conservatives will also pledge to reduce spending on social housing, arguing there will be less demand for it once non-citizens are barred from receiving council accommodation.
Having vowed to repeal the Climate Change Act, Sir Mel will also set out plans to reduce green spending, including subsidies for heat pumps and electric vehicles.
The proposals have been welcomed by the Institute for Economic Affairs (IEA) but the think tank warned they ignored the “elephant in the room” of age-related spending such as pensions.
Earlier this year, the Office for Budget Responsibility warned the pensions triple lock, which remains Conservative policy, would prove “unsustainable” in the longer term.
Tom Clougherty, IEA executive director, said: “Ultimately, no political party is going to be able to balance the books only by cutting things their supporters don’t like.
“Long-term fiscal sustainability requires that we engineer a different trajectory for spending on pensions, social care, and old-age healthcare. Without that, other cuts are likely to amount to running to stand still.”
Labour Party chairwoman Anna Turley said: “The Tories let welfare bills, civil service numbers and asylum hotel use skyrocket on their watch – and they’ve never apologised. Now they want to rehash failed promises from their failed manifesto to try to solve the problems they caused.
“This is the same old Tories, with the same old policies. They didn’t work then and you can’t trust them now.”
Liberal Democrat Treasury spokeswoman Daisy Cooper said it was “clear the Conservative Party learnt absolutely nothing from their disastrous handling of the economy, which left families struggling with a cost-of-living crisis and public services on their knees”.
She added: “Cutting vital support to bring household bills down, trying to balance the books on the backs of people with mental health conditions and slashing the UK’s soft power abroad through aid budget cuts shows Trussonomics is still in full swing.”
The plan to slash the UK aid budget even further is “reckless, short-sighted, and morally indefensible,” according to Bond, the network for organisations working in international development and humanitarian assistance.
Chief executive Romilly Greenhill said: “Marginalised communities who have already borne the brunt of previous cuts will once again pay the price, particularly women and girls and those experiencing conflict. Cutting UK aid doesn’t make us stronger, it makes the world, and the UK, less safe.”
