A Reform UK government would not interfere with interest rate decisions, Robert Jenrick will promise in a drive to reassure mainstream voters that the party is not pursuing Trump-like disruptive economic policies.
The party’s new Treasury spokesman will also guarantee to keep the Budget watchdog in place despite previous scathing criticism of the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) from senior Reform figures.
Jenrick will use his first speech since being unveiled as Reform’s so-called “shadow Chancellor” on Wednesday morning to push back against the agenda promoted by former Conservative prime minister Liz Truss and previously backed by Nigel Farage.
The i Paper understands that he is aiming to send a message to voters and the City that the party can be trusted on the economy – an issue seen as Reform’s major blind spot up until now.
Farage’s ‘shadow cabinet’
On Tuesday, Farage announced his new top team consisting of a set of Reform UK politicians who will be party spokespeople with various briefs, with Richard Tice, Zia Yusuf and Suella Braverman covering business, the Home Office and education, respectively.
He claimed that the line-up proves Reform is no longer a “one-man band” which is overly dependent on his personality, although Labour dismissed the appointments as a “top team of failed Tories”.
Jenrick and Braverman defected from the Conservatives only last month and were senior ministers under Boris Johnson, Truss and Rishi Sunak.
In his speech to the City on Wednesday, however, Jenrick is expected to reject economic policies promoted by Donald Trump and Truss, who have called for politicians to gain more direct control over independent institutions such as central banks.
He will say that in government, Reform would respect the right of the Bank of England (BoE) to set interest rates without political interference, although it would also invite private-sector experts to join the key rate-setting committee.
Only last month, Farage suggested he would seek to change the leadership of the BoE. Asked if he would install a new governor if he were elected, he said: “We’re going to pick different people with a different attitude towards everything to do with economic policy.”
He added: “They should have picked somebody who was a Brexiter to be in charge of the BoE and to think totally differently, especially around financial markets, financial market regulation”.
Jenrick will reform the OBR
Jenrick will also promise to maintain the OBR, which is disliked by some on the right who claim that it enforces economic orthodoxy.
Jenrick will describe Reform as the “only party that will be as careful with your money as you are”, saying: “Everything Reform promises will be fully costed. And because we’re confident about the approach we will take, we’re happy to have our homework marked.
“The OBR is far from perfect. But the impetus for its creation was a desire to instil fiscal discipline, and that is something we wholeheartedly endorse.
“Rather than abolish it, we will reform it. We will break up this cosy consensus and ensure it has diversity of opinion. And we’ll run competitions for superforecasters to join the body and pay competitive salaries to those who most accurately model the impact of Treasury decisions.”
In the past, Reform has been sharply critical of the OBR. Last July, Zia Yusuf branded the watchdog “useless fake experts” who “get every major economic forecast wrong” and have “no credibility”.
When The i Paper asked Farage last year about Yusuf’s comments and whether he would scrap the OBR, the Reform leader questioned the value of the watchdog and suggested he was open-minded to abolishing it.
He said: “I’m not sure the OBR has served any useful purpose over the course of the last few years. I think we elect governments to make decisions, not to rely on everybody as an excuse.”
Economists want ‘more certainty and clarity’
Economists said that Jenrick’s comments would help to reassure markets but warned that uncertainty over Reform’s economic positions would remain.
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Robert Wood of Pantheon Macroeconomics said: “Preserving BoE formal independence and the OBR makes the Reform party platform less of a challenge, but these are the bare minimum requirements.
“Maintaining the OBR is an important step, but the question is whether Reform would accept the OBR’s forecasts or, like Truss, ride roughshod over them.”
Paul Dales of Capital Economics added that the announcements “would reduce some risk of the most damaging outcome” from Reform but said that “there needs to be a lot more certainty and clarity over its policies”.
Dan Tomlinson, a Labour Treasury minister, said: “Jenrick is trying to pull the wool over people’s eyes but he can’t hide from his appalling record in government. Jenrick and his former Tory party smashed family finances and he’d do the same again through Reform.”
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