LONDON (Reuters) – British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said on Monday that his government’s first reaction to higher tariffs imposed by U.S. President Donald Trump should not be to relax public borrowing rules.
Finance minister Rachel Reeves’ fiscal rules – which aim to achieve a balanced current budget by 2029/30 – allow her to suspend them in case of an economic shock. A reporter asked Starmer if he could guarantee this would not happen.
In reply, Starmer said: “The reaction to the challenges of the last few days is not for us to say the first thing we will now do is to put on one side our fiscal rules. It is to remind people why we put them in place in the first place.
“There is enough uncertainty and insecurity as it is,” he added.
Starmer was speaking alongside Reeves at a press conference at a Jaguar Land Rover car factory.
(Reporting by David Milliken; Editing by Sachin Ravikumar)
