Gordon Brown has said there could be a “national uprising” if Liz Truss’s government fails to increase benefits in line with inflation.
The former Labour prime minister weigh in on the row over the uprating of benefits – an issue which has sparked a Tory backbench revolt and prompted signs of cabinet split.
Mr Brown said it would be “immoral” to make a real-terms cut to benefits, after the cost of living has soared to levels unseen in generations.
Ms Truss and chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng have refused to rule out such a cut, as they reportedly consider a move to increase it in line with wages in a bid to shave billions off government spending.
Mr Brown told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme such a move would be “unfair” and “unequal”.
The senior Labour figure said: “It’s divisive because we’re not in this together any more. It’s anti-work because 4 per cent of those who would suffer are people on low pay in work. It’s anti-family because five million children would be in poverty.”
He added: “And I think most of all, it’s immoral. It’s asking the poor to bear the burden for the crisis that we face in this country and for mistakes that other people have made, and it’s a scar on the soul of our country, it’s a stain on our conscience.”
Mr Brown also said an angry public would be against it, warning: “There will be a national uprising if this goes ahead because it is nothing to do with making the growth policies of the government work, it is simply making the poor pay the price.”
On Tuesday, cabinet minister Penny Mordaunt became the most high-profile member of the Truss top team to back calls from Tory MPs to uprate benefits with inflation.
Ms Truss ruled out sacking her former rival for speaking out, one of several rows to dominate the Tory conference as MPs piled on pressure after successfully forcing a U-turn on the 45p top rate of tax.
Former Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith and William Hague spoke out on the benefits issue, with Sir Iain saying “it doesn’t make sense” not to uprate benefits in line with inflation – saying the money would go back into the economy.
Welsh secretary Robert Buckland suggested he too wanted benefits uprated with inflation. But home secretary Suella Braverman launched an attack on “Benefits Street culture”, saying people needed “a bit more stick” to find work.
Mr Brown also hit out at the borrowing-fuelled tax cuts in the mini-Budget, as he warned that the country could expect further crises to come.
“In the long run, what you cannot do is build a growth strategy either around penalising the poor, or around simply giving tax cuts to those who are richest,” he told the programme.
Mr Brown, among the longest-serving of British chancellors, warned that that he did not think the “crisis is over” in the markets.
The former PM said: “You’ve got problems with inflation, potentially problems with liquidity and solvency amongst companies. And you’ve got the potential for markets to be dysfunctional. And I would be worried about the shadow banking – that’s the non-bank financial sector in this country.
“And I would be very careful if I was the Bank of England and make sure that the supervision of that part of the economy is tightened up, because I do fear that, as inflation hits and interest rates rise, there will be a number of companies and a number of organisations that will be in grave difficulty.”
He added: “So I don’t think this crisis is over because the pension funds have been rescued last week.”
