Kwasi Kwarteng heads back to Westminster early as Tory discontent over mini-budget grows – UK politics live

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Here’s more from international trade minister, Greg Hands, who when asked if there will be any more U-turns on the mini-budget, replied: “Let’s wait and see.”

Speaking on Sky News this morning, he said:

Let’s wait and see. You won’t have long to wait for the 31st of October for the Chancellor to lay out those plans. I do say that the prime Minister and the chancellor are absolutely resolute, determined. The growth plan (is) the centrepiece, but we’ll have to see some of the detail including a full forecast from the Office for Budget Responsibility on the 31st of October.

Here is a summary of Hands’s morning interview round:

He suggested the government could make economic announcements ahead of the medium-term fiscal plan on 31 October. He said:

The government will make responses as appropriate as events happen, but the absolute commitment is to publish the medium-term fiscal plan. This is looking at how the government is going to pay for everything, how the government is going to set its budget in the coming years and that will be laid out in just two weeks’ time.

He urged fellow Conservative MPs and the country to “get behind” the chancellor and PM. He said:

Liz Truss is our Prime Minister, she has my confidence she should have the confidence of all Conservative MPs, the whole Conservative Party and actually deserves the confidence of the country as we go into quite difficult economic times with the rise in energy driven by Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, the turmoil in global financial markets.

On reports that senior Tories are considering replacing Truss with a joint ticket of Rishi Sunak and Penny Mordaunt, Hands replied:

I don’t recognise that story at all. I was a supporter of Rishi Sunak; somehow I’d be very surprised at that story. I was talking only yesterday with Penny Mordaunt. I don’t recognise that story at all.

He sought to distance himself from his previous comments during the Tory leadership contest, where he attacked Truss’s “fairytale” economic policies. He said:

There were a number of different proposals flying around by people frankly attached to both camps.

When BBC Radio 4’s Today programme’s Nick Robinson confronted Hands over his earlier remarks and suggested he was “insulting people’s intelligence”, Hands replied:

Things have moved on a lot. The world has changed a lot from the summer.

The international trade minister, Greg Hands, has insisted it is “not unusual” for the chancellor, Kwasi Kwarteng, to be returning early from a trip abroad.

Speaking on Sky News, Hands said:

It’s not unusual to come back a day early from an international visit. He’s coming back for discussions with colleagues, we obviously have the medium-term fiscal plan coming up on 31 October, so just in a couple of weeks’ time. There’s work to be done, there’s conversations to be had with colleagues.

But the major meat of the meetings of the IMF and World Bank have finished and the chancellor of the exchequer has been there two days.

He also insisted on ITV’s Good Morning Britain that the prime minister, Liz Truss, and Kwarteng are safe and sought to emphasise that UK financial markets are not the only ones in turmoil.

After a torrid three weeks since his mini-budget sent the economy – and the Tory party – into turmoil, the chancellor, Kwasi Kwarteng, has left a meeting of the IMF in Washington DC early to return home, amid expectations that he and the prime minister, Liz Truss, will be forced into a humiliating U-turn barely a month into their tenure.

As my colleague Larry Elliott reports:

Kwasi Kwarteng has dramatically cut short his visit to the International Monetary Fund, flying home early from Washington in response to the mounting political crisis over his tax-cutting budget.

Adding to signs that the government is preparing to announce a U-turn over its plan to scrap a rise in corporation tax, the chancellor left the US capital a day earlier than planned.

Treasury sources said the chancellor had two constructive days in Washington but was keen to get back to London to engage with colleagues over his medium-term fiscal plan, due to be announced on 31 October.

But his unscheduled departure on a late-night flight from Washington capped a day of drama for the Truss government and prompted comparisons with the sterling crisis suffered by the Labour government in 1976.

Then, the chancellor Denis Healey turned around at Heathrow rather than fly out to an IMF meeting in Manila after pressure mounted on the pound.

Treasury sources refused to comment on whether Kwarteng’s decision meant a U-turn on corporation tax was imminent, but the chancellor was under pressure to make a decision before the financial markets open for business on Monday.

We will have all the latest developments here on the politics live blog.

Here is the agenda for the day.

Morning. Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Bill – second reading.

9.30am. The Office for National Statistics will publish its latest survey of the social impact of the cost of living, goods shortages, and Covid-19.

10.30am. Charity Asylum Aid is bringing a High Court challenge to the government’s proposals to send some asylum seekers to Rwanda.

12pm. Weekly UK Covid-19 infection survey, from the Office for National Statistics.

3pm. Cop26 president Alok Sharma to speak at the Wilson Centre in Washington.