EX-Chancellor Rishi Sunak will today pledge to give billions of pounds of extra support to households struggling with energy bills if he becomes PM.
Supporters of his rival Liz Truss said Rishi’s latest promise amounted to a ‘mammoth strategic U-turn’.
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The precise details of the latest handouts were being kept under wraps last night.
But Rishi said: “This winter is going to be extremely tough for families up and down the country, and there is no doubt in my mind that more support will be needed.
“As soon as we know how much bills will go up by, I will act.”
But Ms Truss’s allies accused him of flip flopping, saying: “The question for Rishi is how is he going to fund these new promises.”
An ally said: “Three weeks ago he was saying more borrowing was inflationary. Has he changed his mind?”
Mr Sunak insists that in order to keep borrowing down some cash can be found down the back of the sofa instead.
He said: “In order to keep any one-off borrowing to an absolute minimum I will first seek efficiency savings across Whitehall to provide direct support for families.”
Yesterday Deputy PM Dominic Raab took a swing at Truss, saying her plans for offering Brits tax cuts would be “electoral suicide.”
He warned: “If we go to the country with an emergency budget in September that fails to measure up to the task in hand, voters will not forgive us as sure as night follows day, we will see our great party cast into the impotent oblivion of opposition.”
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