Rachel Reeves is trying to impose price caps on supermarkets in backroom negotiations, according to the FT. UKSSR…
The Treasury is pressuring major supermarkets to voluntarily cap prices on essentials. Rachel Reeves is said to be hoping to announce the policy alongside a cost-of-living package on Thursday. In exchange Labour is offering regulatory “incentives” including easing packaging rules and delaying healthy food regulations…
Supermarkets are obviously furious and describing it as a knee-jerk reaction to the SNP’s similar scheme, which has been roundly dismissed as a 70s-style gimmick. Reeves has also also demanded guarantees that farmers wouldn’t lose income from the caps. Has everyone at the Treasury with an economics degree been locked in the cellar?
Tom Baldwin, author of Starmer’s hagiography, spoke to Times Radio:
Tom Baldwin: “I think he’d like to do something. He’s very dutiful and driven by service. That’s why he came into politics. I think that’s characterised his time as prime minister. He hasn’t always sought popularity or been good at being popular. But I think he has some of the necessary qualities that we actually do want in a prime minister. That resilience, that relentlessness, that ability to carry the weight and the job really does weigh very heavily on people and he carries that weight very, very well.”
Jo Coburn: “NATO Secretary-General?”
Tom Baldwin: “I think that’s something that he would be interested in. I think it probably requires Andy Burnham’s government to support him in that and these are some of the questions which Andy Burnham has to resolve quite quickly.”