Leaked remarks suggest Conservatives plan cuts beyond £47bn pledge

The UK Conservatives are planning spending cuts beyond the £47bn already announced if they win the next election, according to leaked remarks by shadow chancellor Andrew Griffith. Griffith made the comments last year, when he was shadow business secretary, telling Conservative members that he and other shadow cabinet ministers had discussed making further savings in every part of government. He linked the prospect of additional cuts to the economy’s deterioration and the party’s ambition to reduce taxes.

A Conservative spokesperson acknowledged that the party was seeking savings beyond its existing plans. The spokesperson said the Conservatives wanted a smaller state and would set out further reductions to Labour’s welfare spending and action against waste at the party conference in Birmingham. Kemi Badenoch has previously outlined a £47bn spending reduction programme.

The plans include welfare cuts affecting non-British or EU citizens, the removal of 132,000 civil service jobs, reductions associated with scrapping most of Labour’s clean-energy scheme and more than £7bn in cuts to international aid. On Friday, Badenoch announced another £4bn of reductions, including £2.5bn from the aid budget and £1bn from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. She said half of the savings would fund an additional 50,000 prison places and has previously promised to use half of any cuts to reduce the deficit.

The leaked comments emerged before the Conservatives’ annual conference. Badenoch is presenting her party’s lower-tax, smaller-state approach as an alternative to Prime Minister Andy Burnham’s programme, which includes a proposed national care service and public control of utility companies. The Conservatives remain third in the polls behind Labour and Reform UK, although the supplied material says Badenoch’s personal ratings have improved over the past year.