'A damning indictment!' Suella Braverman delivers scathing assessment of Rachel Reeves as Britons set to face £4k hike in bills

Georgia Pearce
Thu, 16 Apr 2026 13:59:37 +0000

Suella Braverman has launched a blistering attack on Rachel Reeves following a damning analysis from the International Monetary Fund.

Speaking to GB News, the Reform UK education spokesman declared the figures a "damning indictment" of the Chancellor's performance amid the Middle East conflict.

The assessment follows new analysis from the IMF, which found that Rachel Reeves could oversee the sharpest rise in taxation among all the G7 economies, with the UK’s tax burden forecast to reach 42.1 per cent of GDP by 2030.

The IMF’s analysis places the UK at the top of global rankings for tax increases over the period.

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Delivering her verdict on the IMF's findings, Mrs Braverman told GB News: "It says it all, doesn't it? It's a damning indictment of the state of the economy.

"But more importantly, the devastating decisions made by this Labour Chancellor, and those decisions are, frankly, crippling working families."

Highlighting the struggle of Britons in her own constituency, the Reform MP stressed how she has "lost count" of the number of people who are "struggling to make ends meet" as a result of Ms Reeves's economic policy.

She said: "And I've lost count, actually, in my own constituency of Fareham Waterlooville, of the number of households, small businesses, regular people, workers, the white van man, the local hairdresser on the high street who are really struggling to make ends meet.

"Largely because of the rise in National Insurance, the above inflation increase to the minimum wage and more bureaucracy and cost coming down from this Government."

Questioned by host Miriam Cates on whether she supports "freezing the tax threshold", Mrs Braverman made clear that she would not "announce Reform economic policy" on behalf of her colleagues.

She explained: "I'm not going to announce economic policy on behalf of Reform here, but it all depends on the fiscal situation.

"We've already announced a package of really helpful tax cuts on reversing the fuel duty and cutting the vat and reversing the rise on pubs and certain aspects of hospitality. But there's no doubt about it that the frozen thresholds since about 2020 have effectively been a stealth tax.

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Rachel Reeves is increasing taxes faster than any developed country in the world

"Because people are now being caught in a higher tax bracket than was previously intended, and millions of people like police officers, nurses, teachers are now paying the higher rate of tax when that was never intended."

Criticising Labour's spending on welfare and immigration, Mrs Braverman declared the bill spent by Rachel Reeves is "out of control".

She told GB News: "Our welfare bill is out of control. If we are spending more on welfare than we are on education and schools, that is not right. And we've got too many people claiming out of work benefits.

"Our bill for illegal migrants is out of control. We're spending around £7million a day on asylum seekers, that needs to be brought down. We're spending tens of billions of pounds on carbon capture schemes and solar panels and heat pumps."

Mrs Braverman concluded: "The net zero burden crippling businesses and frankly, the taxpayer has to be brought down, and I think once we've brought down those profligate expenses right now, then we can start talking about how we balance some of our broader welfare spending.

"But those are the big mistakes right now, and if we get those under control, then the economy will be in a much better state."

Rodrigo Valdés, director of the IMF’s fiscal affairs department, said the nature of fiscal pressures had "shifted".

He noted that "weaknesses are no longer mainly cyclical or the result of temporary emergencies but are structural".