Labour’s green handbrake turn gives it a roadmap to No 10

Even if it goes against political creed and credentials, there is sense to changing course if the result is a surer route to power

Rachel Reeves is the first figure in her party to display such flinty resolve since the heyday of Gordon Brown (PA/Getty)

The key to winning power is to be trusted fiscally. Given the party’s electoral history, it is no bad thing for a Labour shadow chancellor to err on the side of prudence – to show that they can look after the nation’s pounds and pennies, even if it means delaying lofty green promises.

Rachel Reeves is the first figure in her party to display such flinty resolve since the heyday of Gordon Brown before the 1997 election. On the BBC’s Today programme this morning, she abandoned her policy of using big borrowing to fund green investment.

Critics have lambasted this abrupt U-turn, accusing Her Majesty’s Opposition of lily-livered political jiggery-pokery at a time of global peril, but in fact it makes sense if Labour is to lead. Even if it goes against Ms Reeves’s political creed and credentials, there is sense to changing course if the result is a surer route to No 10.