David Cameron is facing a furious reaction after insisting he should have “ripped the plaster off” with his austerity measures and made the cuts deeper and faster.
Defending cuts to public services and welfare, the former Tory prime minister dismissed objections from “hysterical” critics, adding: “You’d think we had reinstated the workhouse.”
Despite vast increases in the number of people in the UK resorting to food banks, and alarming levels of homelessness during his premiership, Mr Cameron stood by his economic policy.
Last year, the United Nations poverty envoy concluded the government – through its austerity policy – had inflicted “great misery” on UK citizens with the “punitive, mean-spirited, and often callous” cuts.
But, in the latest extract from his memoir published in The Times, the former Tory leader said he should have imposed greater austerity measures early on in the coalition years.
Responding to Mr Cameron’s remarks, John McDonnell, the shadow chancellor, said: “Cameron clearly has no idea of the scale of human suffering his austerity cuts inflicted on our communities. This confirms how cut off this privileged class of Tories are from the everyday lives of our people.”
In the extract, Mr Cameron said: “My assessment is that we probably didn’t cut enough. We could have done more, even more quickly, as smaller countries like Ireland have done successfully, to get Britain back in the black and then get the economy moving.
“Those who were opposed to austerity were going to be opposed – and pretty hysterically – to whatever we did. Given all the hype and hostility, and yes, sometimes hatred, we might as well have ripped the plaster off with more cuts early on.
“We were taking the flak for them anyway. We should have taken advantage of the window of public support for cuts when it was open.”
He added: “Day after day, the airwaves were thick from hyperbole from interest groups. We were cutting just £1 in every £100 spent, but you’d think we’d reinstated the workhouse.”
Expressing anger at the comments, Labour’s shadow education secretary, Angela Rayner, said: “David Cameron says his mistake with austerity is not doing it harder and faster. A wretched PM whose legacy was one of failure and who brought division to the country.”
