A Conservative poll also gave a boost to Truss’s campaign, with her 32 points ahead of party members, a day after YouGov showed similar results. Javid’s endorsement exposed once again the wide differences in the two campaigns on economic growth on the eve of the Bank of England’s interest rate announcement. Javid, who worked with Mr Sunak at the Treasury and resigned on the same day as Johnson fell, said Mr Truss was best placed to “reunite the party” and said a new approach to the economy was needed – a direct attack in Sunak. “I fought for strong fiscal rules in our last manifesto,” Javid wrote in an op-ed for The Times. “But the circumstances we find ourselves in require a new approach. In the long term, we are more likely to be fiscally sustainable by improving trend growth. “Only by returning growth to pre-financial crisis levels can we hope to support the high-quality public services that people rightly expect.” Sunak and Javid were once considered close allies, although they fell out once Javid returned to the cabinet and clashed over health spending. Experts have warned that UK annual inflation could hit 15% by early 2023 as sharp increases in energy prices drive up the cost of living. The Resolution Foundation thinktank said earlier forecasts were likely to be wrong and that price pressures would last longer and be more intense. Javid’s article directly challenged Sunak’s claim that the tax cuts would be inflationary. “Some argue that tax cuts can only come when we have growth. I believe just the opposite – tax cuts are a prerequisite for growth. Tax cuts now are essential. There are no risk-free options in government. However, in my view, not cutting taxes carries an even greater risk.” He said the government was “sleepwalking into a big-state, high-tax, low-growth social democratic-style model that risks us becoming a middle-income economy by the 2030s with a loss of global influence and power.” Both Truss and Sunak embarked on a field day of campaigning ahead of three major showdowns and debates over the next three days. Tras’s campaign was boosted by two opinion polls showing a surge in support, a day after she was forced to quit politics on regional pay councils following an outcry from MPs. A Truss spokesman said her vision “resonated with members” and she would continue to tour the country to meet them saying she “really enjoyed the opportunity to travel the country”. Sunak’s team said it had held more than 60 events since the start of the campaign, speaking to 5,000 members in person. His team and MPs backing the former chancellor have said they do not believe Truss has as commanding a lead as opinion polls suggest. “The YouGov poll is absolute nonsense: they don’t have data on our members so they can’t weigh it properly,” said one Sunak-supporting MP. But MPs have expressed long-term concern about Tras’s ability to unite the party after its embarrassing U-turn on regional public sector pay cuts. Pointing to an interview given Wednesday by Brandon Lewis in which he was forced to defend the reversal, the senior MP who supported Sunak said it brought back bad memories. “I’m afraid last night’s whole episode was too much Johnson. and so Brandon was repeating this morning all this stuff about “disinformation,” the congressman said. “I’m tired of being told to go out and say things that weren’t true or nonsense and I get upset if I do it again.”
