Rachel Reeves has rebuked her deputy Darren Jones after he compared cutting disability benefits to children’s pocket money.
The chancellor announced two controversial rounds of welfare cuts – both before and during her Spring Statement – as she tries balance the public finances.
But according to analysis from the Department for Work and Pensions, these reforms may lead to an average loss of £4,500 a year for someone on personal independence payments.
The DWP also said the cuts could push 250,000 people, including 50,000 children, into poverty.
Jones, the chief secretary to the Treasury, then caused outrage when he appeared to play down concerns over the real impact of the budget cuts.
He told BBC’s Politics Live that the DwP’s assessment did not account for all the extra money the government were putting into training, skills and work – and then made an unusual comparison.
Jones said: “For example, if I said to my kids, ‘I’m going to cut your pocket money by £10 a week but you have to go and get a Saturday job,’ the impact assessment on that basis would say that my kids were down £10 irrespective on how much they get from their Saturday job.”
Speaking to BBC Radio 4′s Today programme on Thursday, Reeves slapped down her deputy for his “clumsy” remarks.
She said: “He was clumsy in his analogy and he’s apologised for that and rightly so.”
Reeves added: “Of course it’s not pocket money.”
These stern words mark a U-turn from the chancellor, as she actually defended Jones late last night.
She told LBC: “If you have a 16-year-old and say ‘I won’t give you so much pocket money, I want you to go out to work’, and the OBR comes and does an impact assessment and says you’re going to be worse off, you will be worse off if you don’t get a Saturday job, but if they do, they will be better off.
“There are a lot of people who have a disability who are desperate to work.”
But the chancellor may be following Jones’ lead as he apologised for his remarks a few hours after her LBC comments.
“I’m sorry about it, it was tactless and it wasn’t well considered,” the minister told ITV’s Peston show.
“What I was trying to explain in simple terms was what the impact assessment considers and what it doesn’t consider.”
He added: “I should have used a different set of words to explain it, I recognise that wasn’t good enough and I apologise if I’ve offended people.”