While a lot of attention is rightly being focused on the situation in Ukraine and how it could affect the UK, there have been reports in the media that the Labour government in the meantime is planning in the next budget to impose a significant fresh round of spending reductions to public services for example to the NHS and the civil service, and make huge welfare cuts.
This could mean that vulnerable people like the elderly and disabled, already suffering from the withdrawal of the Winter Fuel Allowance, people who are sick and cannot work after suffering from long covid, and people living in the poorest households are set to see their already declining income fall even further.
To make an already bad situation worse, the government now faces the prospect of a damaging defeat in a forthcoming by-election after Mike Amesbury, who had his ten-week jail sentence for a late-night altercation with another man suspended, resigned from parliament as an MP. The voters of Runcorn and Selsby will have the perfect opportunity to show how disatisfied they are with what is happening in the country right now.
Labour have only been in power for eight months, but commentators argue that it is a reasonable enough time for voters to see if any improvements in their lives have been made. Sadly, as the cost of living rises, the government will rightly get blamed, and this could mean candidates from either Conservative or Reform parties winning the seat, helped in part by the mass absention of traditional Labour voters from the democratic process (as indeed happened at last year’s general election).
As I previously posted, Labour could potentially lose another two, currently suspended MPs if the investigation into their conduct sees them getting kicked out of parliament.
The situation on the domestic front continues to get worse for the government… and that is just before the local elections this Spring.