Tulip Siddiq MP

• THE Bank of England warned last week that the United Kingdom could fall into recession by the end of the year, with interest rates soaring and inflation set to hit 13 per cent.

Many of my constituents are already struggling with a cost-of-living crisis that is spiralling out of control.

Each day more and more emails arrive in my inbox from constituents worried about how they are going to pay their bills or put food on the table.

I have heard from desperate parents who are skipping meals so their children can eat and pensioners who are already planning to turn their heating off this winter.

I am concerned about how many of them will survive another six months, let alone the two years that the Bank of England has forecast this recession to last.

My conversations with constituents paint a bleak picture of life in Britain after 12 years of Conservative government.

It is clear that they have lost control of the economy, and it is ordinary people who are suffering the consequences.

And where is the prime minister? Nowhere to be seen.

They have failed to produce a serious plan to tackle this crisis and, instead, seem to have decided to pretend that it simply is not happening.

The cost of living has hardly been mentioned during the Conservative leadership contest.

Instead the former chancellor Rishi Sunak boasted to Conservative party members in Royal Tunbridge Wells that he would take public money out of “deprived urban areas”.

Just days before this, his opponent Liz Truss announced that she would introduce regional pay boards that would result in pay cuts for millions of public sector workers outside London and the south east.

This country needs real leadership and it is clear that neither candidate offers this.

Over the past few months I have been working with my colleagues in the shadow Treasury team to develop policies that would not only rebuild our economy but strengthen it against future crises.

I will continue to put pressure on the government to provide support to the millions already struggling.

For the sake of all of my constituents who are worried about how they are going to pay their bills or put food on the table, I will keep pushing ministers to provide a serious plan to tackle the cost-of-living crisis.

TULIP SIDDIQ MP
Labour, Hampstead & Kilburn