Rachel Reeves, the current Chancellor, has a passion for chess with her favourite move being the Sicilian Defence. Growing up, Reeves competed against privately-educated boys around the country and won as the only state school-educated girl. As a junior chess champion, she utilized her favourite move, which opens up the board for later in the game; it is “particularly good when you want to go on the attack,” she suggests. Her passion for chess has aided her in applying mathematics with constantly changing trade-offs when running the country’s economy.
Reeves started her term as Chancellor by expressing her willingness to have a fight about ripping up red tape holding back the private sector from building new homes and infrastructure – an announcement meant to showcase Labour’s commitment to the growth agenda. In her first speech, Reeves emphasised that Labour was willing to use its landslide election majority to take politically controversial steps that were previously impossible. The cabinet’s presence at the speech was meant to signal significant changes and an end to unstable personality politics.
Reeves aims to change the Treasury into a growth department too with the peer Spencer Livermore and Chief Secretary Darren Jones as deputy for growth and tax respectively. She wants to convey an optimistic path for the UK that attracts investors and wishes to improve the trade-offs, demonstrating her chess thinking. With more confident investors in Labour’s plans, there will be more money, leading to tangible improvements in the economy.
Reeves is known to be tough on adhering to rules designed to limit borrowing for daily spending and will have to make some hard choices, potentially cutting spending on councils, prisons, and courts while raising taxes to do this. Reeves stated that they need the private sector to build homes. The more the private sector steps up, the better the trade-offs will be – with more money from outside, the fewer difficult decisions the government will have to make on spending cuts or tax rises. However, the strong leverage of the private sector over policy is a concern.
Reeves plans to fix the foundations first, rebuild Britain, and make every part of the UK better off, demonstrating that she and the government are playing a rather long game. Her chess-like strategy will be beneficial for the growth of the UK if executed appropriately
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