Where does Labour stand if it won’t reinstate a cap on bonuses for bankers?

While the Opposition has clearly made great progress, just a few days ago the boss of Iceland and former Tory donor Richard Walker said he would be backing Labour at the next general election, it needs to figure out where the line is between backing business and protecting taxpayers.

Shadow Chancellor Rachel Reeves has said the party won’t reinstate a cap on bonuses for bankers if it wins the election.

Reeves says she wants to “be a champion of a successful and thriving financial services industry in the UK”. The cap wasn’t preventing financial services from thriving. It was there to prevent ridiculous bonuses and keep an industry in check that had clearly lost its way leading to the financial crisis.

A crisis that is still reverberating around communities across the country today. The legacy of austerity hasn’t left Britain yet and for many it could only get worse as local authorities face even more difficult decisions.

And it’s worth remembering that it was only three months ago that Reeves, who is also MP for Leeds West, was criticising the decision to axe the cap on bankers bonuses against the backdrop of the cost of living crisis. It suggests that Labour only opposes the Government for opposition’s sake.

However, the Government is so far out of touch with business that all Minister Andrea Leadsom could proffer was advice that firms needed to “adapt” to the new post-Brexit landscape that makes trade much more onerous.