Picture by Times Photographer Richard Pohle. Interview by Steve Swinford, Political Editor: https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/we-must-be-more-radical-and-fast-tra…
Income tax cuts should be brought forward to next year to help stimulate the economy, Sajid Javid has suggested.
The health secretary said that Rishi Sunak’s plans for a 1p cut in income tax in 2024 should be accelerated if the economic outlook improves. He said that the Tories need to be more “radical” and focus more on “Conservative issues” after four in ten Tory MPs voted to remove the prime minister from office.
Javid is the first cabinet minister to make a public call for income tax cuts to be brought forward to next year as Boris Johnson attempts to shore up his authority.
This week the prime minister said that the fact the tax burden is on course to be the highest since the 1940s is an “aberration”. However he declined to say when tax cuts will come. No 10 and No 11 have been resisting a push by cabinet ministers to bring in personal tax cuts in the autumn budget, which will focus on cutting business taxes to encourage investment.
Asked if tax cuts could be brought forward, Javid said: “I know he [Sunak] will want to cut taxes as soon as he can. And if that can be brought forward, of course, it should be brought forward. I want to see a small state that focuses on delivery of the things that really matter. And I want to see taxes as low as possible.”
While backing the prime minister to lead the party into the next election, Javid said that voters wanted to see “honesty and delivery” from the government. “Most colleagues would agree, especially given what happened on Monday night, that people want to see the government boldly, radically taking on the challenges the country faces,” he said.
It is an unlikely confession for a health secretary. “I have the occasional cigar, I have a burger now and again. I like it and I enjoy it and there’s nothing wrong with it,” Sajid Javid says. The idea of a kale smoothie appals him. “I don’t think I’d touch one.”
Javid argues that the state’s role is to provide people with the information to make informed choices — less nanny state, more education. He is not unsympathetic to comments by John Reid, the former Labour health secretary, who defended people’s right to smoke by suggesting it might be the only pleasure for a single mother on a council estate.
“People will decide rightly for themselves, whether they’re going to smoke and drink, they’re going to want to eat fatty foods, but people also will expect the state to warn them of the risks,” he says. “People value information on healthy lifestyles — it’s about moderation.”
Javid, 52, says he does a 10km run every week and also, perhaps unsurprisingly as a former City banker, owns a high-end Peloton exercise bike, a hobby he shares with Rishi Sunak, the chancellor. Unlike Sunak, who enjoys intense Britney Spears-themed workouts, Javid eschews colourful instructors while he is on the bike. “I normally do a 30-minute cycle, just a straightforward [high-intensity] cycle.”
Javid’s views on exercise and an individual’s right to indulge vices — albeit in moderation — is in keeping with his political philosophy. He prides himself as a Thatcherite, a living example of the path from relative poverty to wealth.
His story is remarkable. The child of a Pakistani immigrant who came to Britain with £1 in his pocket, he grew up in a flat above a shop in Bristol with his four brothers. He went to Exeter University and had a career in the City before entering politics in 2010 as the MP for Bromsgrove. He has run six government departments — although all for less than two years — and was chancellor before standing down after a row with Dominic Cummings, who was then senior adviser to the prime minister.
In June last year he returned to the fold as health secretary. Matt Hancock, his predecessor, quit after CCTV video from his office was leaked of him embracing Gina Coladangelo, an old friend and long-term adviser. In one of his first acts, Javid had the CCTV removed. Although health was not his preferred role — he is said to covet the Foreign Office — he insists it is the “most rewarding” job he has had in government because of the numbers that he can help.
He says that his mother joked: “I always wanted one of my sons to be a doctor, it’s is not quite the same, but at least you’re working in healthcare.”
The most prominent of his brothers, Bas, is now a deputy assistant commissioner in the Metropolitan Police, and Javid says his siblings are not shy of ribbing him about his public appearances. “I get banter all the time. We’ve got a brothers’ Whatsapp group, and it’s also got a couple of cousins on there and I think if I showed it to you you’d be shocked. It’s a lot of poking fun and I’m probably top of the list.”
Though he does not criticise his more privileged cabinet colleagues, he argues that his tough background helps him understand people’s struggles with the cost of living. “I know what it’s like when you don’t have enough money to do quite basic things,” he says.
“I am a product of public services in this country — the schools I went to, the medical help when I needed it, going to the local library: I’m proud of public services. Without that, I obviously I wouldn’t be where I am today. I relied so much on public services, let’s say more than a wealthier family would. I absolutely understand the importance of it to families and actually it’s the reason I came into politics.
“It’s right to help people where you can but to accept that the government cannot mitigate every impact within a high inflation environment for every single person. What you focus on is growth. Economic growth is our way out.”
Javid’s role, however, presents contradictions. He is a small-state Tory overseeing a department with a £170 billion budget; a low-tax conservative who backed a 2.5 percentage-point national insurance rise to address Covid backlogs and social care. He insists that the NHS will not receive any more money and says that the focus will now be on reform. “The NHS now has locked in the resources it needs. It doesn’t need any more money. What it needs to deliver for more people is not money: It needs reform.”
Likening the health service to the defunct video store Blockbuster, he says that to carry on delivering care free at the point of use, it has to be drastically rethought. “You want to have a system that, yes, it’s got the values of 1948 but looking at delivery towards 2048,” he argues, citing the need for better leadership, smarter use of data and rethinking GP services and more services provided via the NHS app.
“It is absolutely possible to drive change and reform in the NHS — and we have to, it’s not a choice,” he insists. “The NHS this year, its budget is bigger than the GDP of Greece. We estimate by the end of this parliament it will account for more than 40 per cent of day to day government spending.”
Given the scale of NHS expenditure, does Javid think its budget should be reduced? “No. The question then would really be what would you cut? And I don’t want to see important health services cut,” he says. “What you can certainly do is reduce the growth of NHS spending and deliver more at the same time.”
The scale of challenge is vast. Almost 6.4 million people are on NHS waiting lists and tens of thousands every month are stuck in A&E for more than 12 hours. Labour sees this as an election-winning issue. Javid does not seek to hide the problem, but believes that voters will give the government the benefit of the post-pandemic doubt.
“I’ve been very honest — waiting lists will keep rising before they fall. People appreciate honesty. They want ministers to be frank and treat them like adults. Given everything that the pandemic has still left in its wake, you have significant challenges: people understand that.”
He acknowledges that many of the problems of an ageing population and struggling workforce predate the pandemic, but says: “Health has always been challenging for successive governments, but the pandemic has made it much more so.”
Only a few months ago, any interview with the health secretary would have been dominated by Covid. But despite recent rises in admissions, Javid has few qualms about declaring the pandemic over. “Of course Covid is still out there. Covid is endemic like flu is and other viruses. Thankfully, it’s no longer a pandemic and we’ve got the tools to fight it.”
Britain, he says, is now “properly post pandemic”. While accepting mistakes, he insists: “We should be proud as a country of how we tackled it — we were the first country in the world to open up safely.”
He is not shy about giving his views on other issues, both in this interview and in the cabinet, where he has raised eyebrows among colleagues for interventions on the economy and housebuilding.
Sunak is facing pressure from Tory MPs to bring forward tax cuts after more than one in three Tory MPs voted to remove the prime minister this week.
At present, the chancellor has committed himself to cutting income tax by 1p in the pound in 2024, on the eve of the general election. In the budget that Javid planned to give before he resigned as chancellor, before the pandemic, he had planned to cut income tax by as much as 5p over the course of this parliament.
He is clear that he wants to see tax cuts, and believes that they could encourage growth.“The best way to finance public services is to have a dynamic, low-tax economy that generates growth, that growth will naturally lead to rising revenues for the state that can fund the services,” he argues. “I’m a low-tax Tory — it’s one of the reasons I’m a Conservative and I want to see a small state that focuses on delivery of the things that really matter. And I want to see taxes as low as possible.”
Asked whether cuts in income tax could be brought forward to next year, he is explicit that they could — becoming the first minister to do so. “I know he [Sunak] will want to cut taxes as soon as he can,” he says. “He set out a plan, and I’m sure he would agree that he would want to deliver on that as quickly as possible. And if that can be brought forward, of course, it should be brought forward.
“I want to see a small state that focuses on delivery of the things that really matter. And I want to see taxes as low as possible.”
Javid has himself faced criticism over his own tax affairs. He has admitted that between 2000 and 2006 he was non-domiciled as he spent most of the year outside the UK as a banker. “It’s not unusual if people are moving around. Many developed economies have a similar status,” he says. However, he refuses to say whether he was registered in a tax haven. He responds: “I’ve been open and honest about my tax status, I lived abroad, I worked in New York, I worked in Singapore.”
Javid says that he was “surprised” that more than one in three Tory MPs voted against Johnson, but claims it was a “clear and decisive” victory.
Throughout the parties scandal, he has struck a more forthright note than most of his colleagues. A report by Sue Gray, a senior civil servant, detailing how No 10 staff drank so much they vomited, red wine was spilt on walls and parties descended into brawls was “sobering reading”. He says: “There were, as Sue laid out, a lot of incidents that cause concern. Was I disappointed to learn about what had been happening. Of course, who wasn’t?”
The scandal is not over. Johnson is under investigation by the privileges committee, a cross-party group that is looking into whether he knowingly misled the Commons. The issue would represent a potential resigning issue. Unsurprisingly Javid says he accepts the prime minister’s version of events. “He’s apologised for what’s happened, even things that he wouldn’t have known about at the time but he’s rightly come forward and accepted responsibility. The prime minister has given an explanation and I accepted his explanation.”
While backing the prime minister to lead the party into the next election, Javid said that voters wanted to see “honesty and delivery” from the government. “Most colleagues would agree, especially given what happened on Monday night, that people want to see the government boldly, radically taking on the challenges the country faces,” he said.
Javid suggests that the Tories need to be bold and radical to recover. “Most colleagues would agree, especially given what happened on Monday, that people want to see the government boldly, radically taking on the challenges the country faces. People are going to want to see delivery. They want to see focus on Conservative issues.”
He is keen to see more housebuilding. This week the prime minister announced plans to extend the right to buy to people who rent from housing associations and enable low-paid workers to use housing benefit to get a mortgage.
Javid argues that there need to be “supply-side” reforms, with new towns and cities. He speaks favourably of a new generation of garden cities — a pledge that dates back to the coalition but is winning favour again in Conservative ranks after a Tory revolt over an overhaul of planning rules.
“We do need to build more homes. Of course we do because it’s supply and demand,” he says. “Garden cities and villages and new towns is absolutely something to look at.”
While planning reforms have been dropped to assuage backbenchers, Javid argues that local resistance need not be feared. “I can understand if you live in a community where you don’t want to see radical change, but what I have often found is that if it’s done thoughtfully and planned out post the development, people are very accepting and they wonder what all the fuss was about. So it can be done.”
His self-belief is evident. He pointedly dodges when asked to choose between Johnson and Margaret Thatcher, but gives an instant answer when asked to choose between his two predecessors. Jeremy Hunt or Matt Hancock? “Sajid Javid.”
