Spring Statement: A Whole Nation Minute Round-Up

Co-founder of Whole Nation Conservatives Igraine Gray is a Conservative activist and former council candidate, writer, published author and rehabilitated rough sleeper. Prior to the 2024 General Election she was Policy Assistant to Sir Simon Clarke.

Spring is noted as a time of rebirth, growth and renewal. Rebirth, growth and renewal are sadly nowhere to be found in the Government’s Spring Statement. There are a few seeds, the odd idea, which could grow into something. As with quite a lot of policy proposals of all political persuasions, it suffers a lot from the ‘nice words, bad actions’ disease that is currently rife.

Economic growth is the base upon which Whole Nation’s goals would be achieved, and is one of the few points of political consensus in existence. The Government has had a lot of words to say about its importance and its commitment to delivering economic growth, and repeated much of the rhetoric in the Spring Statement. However, the actions they have taken have largely been in direct conflict with that goal, damaging confidence, and the impact of the Employers Rights Bill is yet to be felt. Though there are exceptions - increased housebuilding from reforms included the Government’s National Planning and Policy Framework being one, which the OBR estimates can add 0.2% to real GDP by 2030 (3) and there are initial ideas in welfare and civil service reform (2) which have some promise. There is so much room to go further on this however and only time will tell if the Government has the stomach for it.

The conflict of words and actions has been borne out in the changes in the updated Office of Budget Responsibility (OBR)’s Economic and Fiscal Outlook released alongside the statement. The headline, the annual real GDP growth forecast for 2025 being halved from 2% in October to 1% (1), with forecasts in subsequent years only marginally improving against a backdrop of foreseeable and probable fiscal shocks and the same dangerously thin level of fiscal headroom as was left in October (1). This alongside lower productivity, higher borrowing and GDP growth coming in at under the 2 per cent mark every single forecasted year after is a damning indictment of the Government’s economic policy, and doesn’t come close to the annual growth of 2.9 per cent a year needed over the next 50 years just to maintain the equivalent of today’s welfare state (4).

Has the Spring Statement shifted our view of the Government’s direction? No, the statement has been at pains to tweak at the edges, to try and maintain its unsustainable plans. If anything, it cements in all our worst fears:

“The Budget does not drive towards the ambition of harnessing the talents of all regions, generations, and socio-economic backgrounds. Rural deprivation is overlooked. It misunderstands the root causes of our country’s most embedded problems and is, in equal measure, far too radical and not radical enough. It weaponises class, trashes social mobility, and crowds out the private sector… all for a sugar rush that will last the equivalent of five minutes before hastily leaving a bad taste in your mouth.” - Whole Nation Conservatives on October’s Budget, November 2024.

Much of this has played out, much to the detriment of the British people. The sugar rush has definitely gone and the bad taste is only just beginning.

References

1. Economic and fiscal outlook – March 2025 - Office for Budget Responsibility (obr.uk)

2. Spring Statement Speech Transcript: Spring Statement 2025 speech - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

3. Spring Statement Full Document: CP1298 – Spring Statement 2025 (publishing.service.gov.uk)

4. Justice for the Young - The Centre for Policy Studies (cps.org.uk)