Andy Burnham to face first PMQs as borrowing costs rise – UK politics live

PMQs comes as Resolution Foundation says it is not ‘realistic’ to think defence spending can increase without tax risesAnalysis: new battle lines drawn as the leaders face offAndy Burnham’s speech to MPs yesterday was “the last thing” that investors wanted to hear, according to Jim O’Neill, the former Goldman Sachs chief economist who served as a Treasury minister under David Cameron.O’Neill, who sits in the Lords as a crossbencher, is not a regular Burnham basher; he is a big supporter of Burnham’s devolution agenda and he has been an informal adviser to the PM. There were even discussions about his taking a job in the No 10 team, which floundered because he did not want a formal role.Andy made his first big speech in parliament since after the recess … and the tone of it, implying a lot more government spending to take control of X, Y, and Z, is the last thing that investors want to hear on a day where all of this is going on in the background.And so yes, they’re like, ‘Who’s going to get real in this country about the challenges of getting our debt down and controlling spending?’‘It is a tough day. Ten-year gilt yields or 10-year interest rates have risen by a quarter of a percent, which in one day is a lot. We’ve not had that since Liz Truss days …If your country, whether it be ours or others, is under the focus of ‘Can they come up with a sensible fiscal strategy?’ on a day where the markets think ‘Well, no you’re not showing any signs of it’, they’re going to have a bad day.Kemi Badenoch asked if Burnham would:-Set out a plan to get defence spending to 3% of GDP; Continue reading...