Have the Tories ditched Thatcherism in favour of big spending?

Rishi Sunak’s Budget includes plans to splash the cash – but tax cuts also on cards

Rishi Sunak and Boris Johnson
Rishi Sunak and Boris Johnson visit a brewery in London after announcing a cut in duty rates for draught beer
(Image credit: Dan Kitwood/WPA Pool/Getty Images)

Record tax and spending increases in Rishi Sunak’s newly unveiled Budget represent a major “shift” in Tory philosophy, a Treasury minister has said.

The chancellor yesterday announced a £150bn boost for government departments, while “taxes are rising to their highest level as a percentage of GDP since the 1950s”, Sunak said. “I don’t like it, but I cannot apologise for it, it’s the result of the unprecedented crisis we faced and the extraordinary action we took in response,” he told MPs, in a reference to the Covid pandemic.

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