Red Rachel’s Budget

The Chancellor has reverted to a classic socialist tax-and-spend approach

What is the difference between Ellen Wilkinson and Oswald Mosley?

Red Rachel Reeves has replaced a picture of Nigel Lawson with one of Wilkinson, a founder of the Communist Party of Great Britain and a staunch defender of Stalin. Indeed, Wilkinson accused those who criticised Stalin of ‘malicious inventions’ and said the allegations of persecution of religious people were ‘false’. She also consorted with a known Soviet agent and received financial benefit from her links to the Soviet Union.

Wilkinson, a sympathiser and defender of a mass murderer, bordered on being a traitor, yet is seen by the Chancellor of the Exchequer as one of her ‘leading lights’. Just imagine if, instead of Wilkinson, her admiration was for another one-time Labour cabinet minister, the fascist Oswald Mosley.

That Reeves has put up Wilkinson's picture shows her either to be deeply ignorant of early 20th century history, or much more left-wing than previously imagined. This helps define the background to this week’s Budget.