| Rachel Reeves will deliver her budget tomorrow — the first by a Labour government in 14 years, the first in history by a female chancellor, and set to be one of the UK’s biggest ever tax-raising events. It’s going to be big, but the path for success is narrow.
As Philip Aldrick writes today in his essential briefing on everything to look for, Reeves has given herself “the seemingly contradictory tasks of ending austerity in public services, boosting growth and delivering fiscal stability to reassure markets that Labour can be trusted with the UK’s finances.” Markets will be watching closely. The Liz Truss mini-budget disaster is still fresh in people’s minds, and government debt issuance this year and next are the highest on record outside the pandemic. Already, bond markets have reacted negatively to the prospect that Reeves could borrow as much as £70 billion more over the parliament than forecast thanks to changes she will make to the fiscal rules — but as Philip writes, she is alert to the danger and could increase borrowing by less than her new rules allow. The British public will be watching too — and therein lies the second jeopardy. Reeves is expected to unveil one of the biggest ever tax-raising budgets, just months after an election in which she and Keir Starmer pointedly did not discuss record tax rises. After weeks of bickering over the definition of “working people” (they pledged in the campaign not to raise taxes on them) zoom out and there is a big and legitimate question: where is Labour’s mandate for this? Already, there are nerves in the Labour camp about how this will land and what the front pages will look like on Thursday morning. Today Reeves and Health Secretary Wes Streeting said there would be new NHS funding in the budget. It follows polling commissioned by Labour Together — and duly noted by people around Reeves — showing voters are more amenable to tax rises if the money is being spent on the NHS. I’ll be joining colleagues on the budget live blog tomorrow with instant reaction and analysis — and you can find all of our coverage here. If you have questions about how Reeves’ budget will affect your money, you can put your questions to a panel of our brilliant experts in a live post-budget audio Q&A, starting at 3.15 p.m. tomorrow. Want this in your inbox each weekday? You can sign up here. | 
