Ms Truss and Mr Sunak are at loggerheads over their rival plans to help households. Mr Clarke said Mrs Truss was right to avoid making further commitments until closer to October, when more will be known about the price rise and she will have support from the civil service.
He added: “I really find it quite strange that high earners are getting £400 off their bills.
“As Conservatives, we certainly have to believe in putting taxpayers’ money to the best possible use so that we actually get the best value and keep the burden on the exchequer as low as possible.
“It is not an ideal outcome, to put it mildly, for people who do not need to receive quite substantial sums from the state. Honestly, it’s not a targeted package, is it?’
Ms Truss’ team is understood to have not decided at what income level the discount will stop.
Asked if there was a specific method by which anyone other than high earners could get the benefit, Mr Clarke said: “That’s the question we have to go back to – can we do more through tax, can we do more through the welfare system… There are more ways we can approach the question of how to get that help than just using Rishi’s bailout 3.0.”
Meanwhile, The Telegraph revealed that Andrew Bailey, the governor of the Bank of England, told the chancellor he would be “open to a review” of the Bank of England’s mandate, following Mrs Truss’ criticism of her approach to inflation.
“Energy market reforms must be our top priority,” says Simon Clarke
For days, Liz Truss has been under pressure from Rishi Sunak to outline how she will support households facing crippling energy bills in the autumn.
But Simon Clarke, who was Mr Sunak’s number two at the Treasury for two-and-a-half years and is now a member of Ms Truss’ inner circle, believes the foreign secretary must now stand firm after previously set out plans to reverse National Insurance increases and stop green fees on bills.
“My sincere preference is that we avoid committing ourselves too firmly to a course of action in mid-August,” said Mr Clarke, who remains chief secretary to the Treasury.
“In just over three weeks there will be a new government that actually has all the support of the civil service and all the opportunities that that offers and the ability to work as a government to come up with the best solutions.”
“There was a temptation … for us to kind of ‘go now, go now, go now.’ Everyone agrees that this situation is urgent.
“But … given that we will have the numbers we need by the end of the month and that we will then have the time we need to respond in September before this rate cut comes in in effect, there is time for due process.”
Clarke, 37, has risen rapidly through the Tory ranks since winning Middlesbrough South and Cleveland East from Labor in 2017. Within months, he joined the Freer, a free markets group launched by Liz Truss and backed by MPs including Kwasi Kwarteng and Therese Coffey, two other key lieutenants in the foreign secretary’s leadership campaign.
Mr Clarke is now being touted for a prominent role as business, trade or housing secretary in a cabinet led by Ms Truss, with Mr Kwarteng expected to replace Nadhim Zahawi as chancellor.
“Positive Attraction Liz”
He says there was “never a formal conversation with Rishi” in which Mr Clarke told his former boss he had chosen to back Ms Truss over him. He has since been highly critical of the former chancellor, including saying last week that Mr Sunak had “lashed out” against efforts to cut red tape in the EU.
Mr Clarke says he and Mr Sunak, his constituency neighbour, had a “perfectly good working relationship” at the Treasury. He insists it was “Liz’s positive pull, not anything Rishi did when I was with him at the Treasury, that led me to this decision.”
Yet one of the many criticisms of Mr Sunak’s approach includes the former chancellor’s decision – due to be implemented this autumn – to give every household an automatic £400 discount on their energy bills in October.
Mr Clarke said the plans should be “reviewed”, saying: “I do find it quite strange that high earners are getting £400 off their bills – I’ll be honest.
“As Conservatives, we certainly have to believe in putting taxpayers’ money to the best possible use so that we actually get the best value and keep the burden on the exchequer as low as possible.
“It is not an ideal outcome, to put it mildly, for people who do not need to receive quite substantial sums from the state. Honestly, it’s not a targeted package, is it?’
After criticism of the plan in May, Mr Sunak said: “You can give that money to charity if you don’t need it.” Last week he said he would give his own payment to charity.
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