The Budget: Did Rachel Reeves Mislead the Public in the Run-Up?

Newscast

BBC

Politics, News

4.4 • 6.4K Ratings

🗓️ 29 November 2025

⏱️ 43 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Today, Laura and Paddy look at claims that Rachel Reeves misled the public after it emerged that she knew the outlook for the government’s finances had improved before giving a downcast pre-Budget speech.

Downing Street has denied the allegations.

Luke Sullivan, Keir Starmer's former political director, is also in the Newscast studio to give his assessment on those accusations, and how the budget has been received inside the Labour Party.

You can now listen to Newscast on a smart speaker. If you want to listen, just say "Ask BBC Sounds to play Newscast”. It works on most smart speakers.

You can join our Newscast online community here: https://bbc.in/newscastdiscord

Get in touch with Newscast by emailing [email protected] or send us a WhatsApp on +44 0330 123 9480.

New episodes released every day. If you're in the UK, for more News and Current Affairs podcasts from the BBC, listen on BBC Sounds: https://bbc.in/4guXgXd

Newscast brings you daily analysis of the latest political news stories from the BBC. The presenters were Paddy O’Connell and Laura Kuenssberg. It was made by Chris Flynn with Rufus Gray. The social producer was Sophie Millward. The technical producer was Mike Regaard. The weekend series producer is Chris Flynn. The assistant editor is Chris Gray. The senior news editor is Sam Bonham.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	BBC Sounds, music, radio, podcasts.
0:07.5	With American politics, everything seems to be changing by the second.
0:11.9	Yeah, sometimes the news does a full 180 while we're recording the podcast.
0:16.4	It can be a difficult job, but we stay up to date on your behalf.
0:19.9	Makes sense of what's happening in the US with new podcast episodes throughout the week.
0:24.2	America's. Listen on BBC Sound.
0:27.6	So, Paddy, some journalists sometimes make predictions, don't they?
0:31.2	I think it makes things more interesting when they do.
0:33.7	It's a jeopardy.
0:35.0	When they say, only time will tell.
0:36.8	Well, only time will tell is a sackable phrase in my view, as is remains to be seen.
0:41.5	I'm sure I've said both myself on many occasions, because I also am happy to be wrong.
0:46.2	This is what you said on the 5th of July 2025 when we were marking the anniversary of the Labour government.
0:55.0	I'm going to say two things.
0:56.3	One is about the policy that we think will go next,
0:58.6	which is any change to the two-child benefit cap.
1:01.5	Yes.
1:02.0	And then I'd like to cast back to this newscast,
1:04.9	which said before the general election,
1:07.4	anyone who won, any government was going to have to put up taxes.
1:11.8	That's on the record.
1:15.5	There are many podcasts. You said it again and again and again and again. Yeah.
	...

Transcript will be available on the free plan in 24 days. Upgrade to see the full transcript now.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from BBC, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of BBC and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.