Coronavirus: Third of Rishi Sunak’s £30bn was ‘old money passed off as new’

Rishi Sunak has been accused of twisting the figures in his summer statement by repackaging £10 billion of previously committed spending as a new deal to save jobs.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies said the chancellor’s attempt to pass off old money as new spending was “corrosive to trust”. After analysing last week’s mini-budget, the public finance think tank found that up to £10 billion of investment in public works and skills would be funded by savings as other projects were cancelled.

The £5.5 billion announced by Boris Johnson for transport and infrastructure before the summer statement, which he presented as a new deal in the vein of the US president Franklin Roosevelt, was not new money at all, it said.

“All that