John Healey has vowed that Labour will reduce the benefits bill, after admitting the current system is “not working”.

The Chancellor created widespread confusion earlier this week, after failing to clarify whether the ballooning cost of welfare will be cut before the next election by declining to put a timeframe to it.

But Healey claimed on Sunday that the bill will shrink under this government, after being pressed once more on if he will lower the costs or stem the rate of increase.

Speaking on BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg, he said: “We’ll start the changes next year, and we’ll bring that bill down, and we’ve already demonstrated how we’ll do that for the long-term.

“This is a system which is not working. We have to make big changes. We will.”

Healey added that the rate of increase in the benefits bill has slowed since Labour took office, while “numbers were booming under the Tories”.

Making hard decisions

Healey said the government is also “prepared to make hard decisions” on major cuts to public spending.

The UK’s debt piles stands at roughly 95 per cent of total GDP, according to the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR).

The fiscal watchdog has also predicted that growth will slump and joblessness and inflation will surge in the coming years, as they warned John Healey will have to find billions of pounds more revenue between 2029 and 2032 in order to prevent cuts to government spending. 

The OBR said the Chancellor would need to find an extra £11bn in his plans to stop day-to-day spending from falling by 2.6 per cent in real terms in the final three years of the fiscal forecast. 

“In this Budget, we’ve already demonstrated we are prepared to take hard decisions about the priorities in Government,” he said.

“We will carry that through into the 10-year plan and the spending review next year.”

He pointed to devolution and the transformation of public services as ways to make efficiency savings and “meet the challenge of the spending review”.

“Small beer” Budget

Healey’s word follow his maiden Budget on Wednesday, which many economists argued failed to address market fears and pressing economic issues.

Former economic adviser to Andy Burnham, Andy Haldane, hailed it as “small beer”, claiming Healey failed to quash nerves surrounding government policy.

The ex Bank of England chief economist told Kuenssberg: “We are in a public finance mess…more is needed of a radical nature. This week’s Budget was not that radical budget.”

“It was small beer, lots of items, all of small value”