Iain Duncan Smith resigns in protest at the Budget

In the last few minutes, Iain Duncan Smith has released a letter of resignation from his post as Work & Pensions Secretary. The proximate cause is the Budget cuts to disability benefits. He knew about them, but had wanted a consultation paper to be published so the government could make the argument carefully, over many weeks, given that this is a hugely controversial topic. Instead, George Osborne presented the disability cuts as a £1.3 billion fait accompli in the Budget and these cuts to finance tax cuts for higher-rate earners and lowering capital gains tax. IDS said in his letter to David Cameron that this is ‘not defensible’. It was the juxtaposition, rather than the cuts on their own, that made him walk.

In his letter, he says he has had enough of decisions taken for party political interest rather than in the national interest – by which he means the ring-fencing of pension-age benefits, child benefit, winter fuel allowance and other electoral promises which meant that IDS had to focus the pain of the cuts on the working-aged.