KEIR STARMER didn’t get the hero’s welcome a victorious Labour leader might have expected from the TUC.

Instead, his Tory-lite policies were greeted in the same way unions treat Conservative politicians!

Labour is already in a mess, mainly of its own making.

Its claims the winter fuel cuts stopped a stock market meltdown were ridiculed. By the stock market!

So why are Reeves and Starmer pursuing policies that amount to political hari-kari?

Put simply, Labour is enslaved to Treasury dogma, drawn up by unelected, establishment mandarins determined to block the changes most people want.

First, these ‘posh boys’ insist that government spending only discourages millionaires from investing.

Second, they want a high value pound but they won’t admit the real cause of inflation is the lust for profit.

Third, their economic bible insists there must always be low taxes on business and the rich.

They also want a so-called ‘small state’.

This always means underfunded health, education and social services for the likes of us.

This Treasury theorising is a con!

There are 100,000 NHS vacancies.

Research by the Health Foundation shows we massively trail French and German spending on health.

Our government punishes pensioners for the sake of £1.3bn, yet Shell, BP, Mobile etc. make a billion a week in profits!

Only a transfusion of some of this colossal wealth will stave off the gathering storm of council bankruptcies and service cuts.

‘Broke Britain’ is a myth, with The Sunday Times Rich List celebrating a “golden era for the super-rich’’.

We should ask: “Why is there billions for defence but austerity for the people they’re claiming to defend?”

C Walker, Darlington.