Exclusive: Read Richard Foord's damning review of last week's mini-budget

This article is written by Richard Foord, the MP for Tiverton and Honiton.

Where do you plan to be on 23rd November? I intend to be where I was last Friday, in Parliament challenging the Chancellor of the Exchequer on his latest budget. Let us hope that whatever is brought forward is nothing like the mess that the Government produced last Friday in their "mini budget" - although I am not holding my breath.

The Chancellor started the debate on his plans by patronisingly pointing out that he wanted to "grow the size of the pie." I think we all understand that a bigger economy could potentially mean that we can afford to cut taxes, and each receive a bigger piece of the pie. However, Kwasi Kwarteng then offered us a lesson in how to make a smaller pie - by removing key ingredients and leaving it half-baked.

Let's consider the contents of this new 'mini' budget.

The Conservatives chose to cut taxes for the very wealthiest in society. They scrapped the 45% rate of income tax - giving someone earning £2 million a year a tax cut of more than £92,000 - ended the cap on bankers' bonuses, and cancelled plans to increase taxes on big corporations. No wonder many have come to view this budget as a bankers' and billionaires' budget.

These tax cuts won't clear the NHS backlog or ensure that when dial 999 an ambulance won't take hours to arrive. Instead, all they will do is deprive our schools, hospitals, and other vital services of the funding they need and see the Government borrow billions more – leaving us all pick up the tab for decades to come.

Shockingly, there was no additional support for the millions already struggling to pay their bills alongside these big giveaways to the wealthy. By failing to offer extra help, the Government has wilfully left people out in the cold and worried about how they will survive this winter.

But looming large over all the things announced was the fact that inflation remains high – sitting at about 10%. This means that the value of our money is decreasing by 10%, buying less as things start to cost more. But in the mini budget, there was no recognition of this.

Despite promising no cuts during her leadership campaign Liz Truss has since refused to guarantee that she will increase Government budgets to match. Indeed, we hear that just recently she has ordered another wave of stealth cuts, or as she prefers to call them "efficiency savings", across all Government departments. Add that to the growing pile of broken Conservative promises.

The dire consequences of the budget have been felt in the days since. The sharp rise in interest rates that we anticipate will hit all of us hard. It means next time you seek to renew your mortgage, extend the term of your tenancy, or extend the term of your loan; you are likely to be paying hundreds of pounds more as a result.

This is a ticking timebomb for households that are already cutting back to make ends meet.

Liz Truss has agreed that she is prepared to be an unpopular Prime Minister. When I heard this, I must say I found myself respecting that - because to me leadership is about doing the right thing, not just what is popular.

However, with this mini budget they have aptly demonstrated that they have no clue either what is right or what is popular. All they have done is made things worse, then spent days hiding away to try and ride out the storm while the situation spiralled. This is not leadership; this is a farce.

We cannot afford to wait; Parliament must be recalled urgently so we can try and fix the damage wrought by this utter shambles of a budget.

Read more:

Richard Foord urges government to take 'drastic action' in the face of £3,549 energy bills

'A disaster': Honiton residents react to last week's 'mini-budget'