The shadow chancellor is set to unveil proposals to slash £47 billion of government spending in a bid to counter Reform UK.
Sir Mel Stride will use his speech at the conference in Manchester on Monday to set out a plan to cut welfare, foreign aid and the civil service spending if his party wins the next election.
Among the plans to be announced is a £23 billion cut to the welfare bill, replacing payments to people with “low-level” mental health conditions with treatment and barring non-citizens from claiming support.
If implemented today, the policy would prevent around 470,000 people — about 6 per cent of the UK’s eight million universal credit claimants — from receiving the benefit.
The same restrictions would apply to disability benefits and the carer’s allowance, though access to pensions and public services would remain unchanged.
EU citizens with settled status under the Brexit agreement with Brussels would be exempt.
It follows an opening speech from Kemi Badenoch in which she pledged that “economic responsibility” would “run through this conference like the words in a stick of Blackpool rock” in an attempt to distance the Conservatives from ex-prime minister Liz Truss’s disastrous mini-budget, which spooked financial markets.
Tories threaten to strip migrants of right to claim benefits
The shadow chancellor is set to unveil proposals to bar non-UK citizens from claiming benefits if the Conservative Party wins power.
Among the plans to be announced on Monday is a £23 billion cut to the welfare bill, replacing payments to people with “low level” mental health conditions with treatment and barring non-citizens from claiming support.
If implemented today, the policy would prevent around 470,000 people — about 6% of the UK’s eight million universal credit claimants — from receiving the benefit.
The same restrictions would apply to disability benefits and the carer’s allowance, though access to pensions and public services would remain unchanged.
EU citizens with settled status under the Brexit agreement with Brussels would be exempt.
Athena Stavrou6 October 2025 09:08