Green leader attacked for ‘unfunded promises’ after pledging to take Britain back into customs union and cap wages
Zack Polanski plans to cap wages and introduce universal support for energy bills (Image: Getty)
Zack Polanski would betray Brexit and take Britain back into the EU customs union – a move critics say would make the cost-of-living crisis worse. The Green leader has also pledged to cap wages at 10 times a company’s lowest-paid employee and to roll out universal support for energy bills.
Mr Polanski, who also wants to introduce rent controls, said: “The affordability crisis is something affecting nearly everyone, from the most vulnerable to people in work and comfortable,” and fumed at the Labour and Conservatives for their choices. But critics have blasted the Left-wing party for not saying how it would fund its radical pledges.
Anna Turley, chairwoman of the Labour Party, attacked the Greens’ “unfunded promises” and said the use of food banks, which the Green Party aims to tackle, is “coming down with Labour”.
She added: “Zack Polanski won’t say what his promises will cost, and he won’t say how he’d pay for them. That means he can’t keep them.”
Labour is under threat from the Greens’ soaring poll ratings, with deputy leader Rachel Millward saying “millions face food insecurity, food poverty and turn to food banks to prevent them going hungry”.
Callum Price, of the Institute of Economic Affairs, said that the Greens’ measures would “not do anything to tackle the cost of living” and said in many cases they would make problems “far worse”.
He added: “Bankrupting the taxpayer and spooking the markets with limitless, uncosted spending pledges is not how we help the poorest in our society.”
On rent controls, he added: “The evidence on rent controls is clear: they harm the very people they try to help by making rented housing more scarce, lower quality, and more expensive for so many.”
And he said rejoining the customs unions would “serve only to tie our hands when we should be doing the opposite – using our sovereignty to pursue trading agreements that will drive costs for consumers down”.
He also said pay ratios would mean a “huge pay cut for the people who lead, drive, and grow successful businesses”.
“Why would anyone in the UK seek to set up a business, the sort that can be the lifeblood of local communities, under these conditions?” he asked.
“Is it too much to ask for our politicians to examine evidence and think properly before pledging populist policies?”