How do you fill a £50bn black hole?

‘The bombing of Hiroshima saved my grandfather’| Seven significant traits of a sociopath

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Wednesday, 6 August 2025 Welcome to From the Editor – the very best from our newsroom delivered to your inbox daily. Rachel Reeves is trapped in a £50bn black hole. With record-breaking £40bn tax increases barely making a dent, the Chancellor is scrambling for creative ways to fill the gap as we edge closer to the October Budget. Tim Wallace, our Deputy Economics Editor, examines her options. I’d love to hear what you think of this newsletter. You can email me your feedback here. Chris Evans, Editor P.S. You can enjoy three months’ free access to The Telegraph. Cancel at any time. Today’s headlines HMRC plans new private school tax grab Prince Harry reprimanded for crisis at charity Gary Lineker snapped up by ITV after BBC exit Ukrainian raid behind enemy lines kills 330 Russian troops Clintons ordered to testify in Epstein investigation Labour to cap skilled migration Doge staffer ‘Big Balls’ beaten in brutal attempted carjacking Britain must wake up Follow rigorous reporting on the threats to our democracy Enjoy three months’ free access to The Telegraph. Cancel at any time. Subscribe now   Reeves facing £50bn black hole as tax pressure mounts Tim Wallace Deputy Economics Editor   Rachel Reeves hoped she had fixed the public finances for good last year. Her record-breaking £40bn tax increases in October’s Budget were supposed to draw a line under the bad news for the rest of this Parliament. But those tax rises shattered business confidence and undermined the jobs market. Combine that with stubbornly high borrowing costs, the about-turn on plans to trim the welfare bill, and the fallout from Donald Trump’s trade war, the result is that the Chancellor faces a fresh black hole even bigger than the old one. Analysts at the National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR) estimate that Ms Reeves needs to find more than £50bn in the autumn. It will be hard to cut spending. Labour MPs are in a rebellious mood, and are riding high after forcing Ms Reeves and Sir Keir Starmer to reverse course on winter fuel and benefits payments. Changing the borrowing rules is a non-starter. The Chancellor has ruled it out and NIESR warns of “another Liz Truss moment” if she changes her mind. That means tax rises are the path of least resistance. Labour backbenchers are clamouring for a wealth tax, while Conservatives warn of a “disastrous loop of higher taxes and lower growth”. Read the full story here ➤   Opinion and analysis   Allison Pearson Award-winning journalist and Telegraph columnist Our complicit elite is to blame for every sexual assault by an illegal migrant Continue reading ➤     Ed Cumming Senior Features Writer The rise of early dinners is the death of civilisation Continue reading ➤     Ambrose Evans-Pritchard World Economy Editor Europe’s ‘great power’ dream is in tatters – but don’t tell Britain’s Rejoiners Continue reading ➤   Free thinking. Straight talking. Explore more opinion from the nation’s leading comment writers Enjoy three months’ free access to The Telegraph. Cancel at any time. Subscribe now     Must reads ‘The bombing of Hiroshima saved my grandfather – and tens of thousands more’ David Blair’s grandfather pictured holding his uncle in 1940 The seven significant traits of a sociopath and how to spot one ‘My mankeeper wife always wants me to share my feelings. Why can’t she just leave me alone?’ The foreign governments warning citizens about the dangers of visiting crime-ridden Britain ‘After my mum died of dementia I knew I had to change my life to save my brain’   The best of the Telegraph   Revealed: the full, devastating impact of Labour’s VAT raid on private schools Two weeks ago The Telegraph’s money team revealed the devestation that Labour’s tax raid on private schools has caused. Analysis has found that 44 independent schools have shut down, while 6,000 children have had their education upended. The Government says the policy will raise £1.7bn, but a watered-down pledge to hire 6,500 new teachers offers little confidence in how the VAT revenue will be spent. Pieter Snepvangers dissects the impact so far. The response in the comments was huge. Now you can to join in the conversation. See the full list here ➤   Discuss Every day our journalists discuss the day’s biggest issues with subscribers on our app and on our website. Yesterday, Orlando Bird, our Letters Editor, responded to a reader’s comments under the piece: Without real deterrence, any plan to tackle illegal migration will fail. Paul Butler Not many enjoyed French or German at the comprehensive school I went to. Maybe that was down to the teachers, the head of French was away with the fairies, and I did know her out of school as she lived locally. My wife, on the other hand, went to a private school and enjoyed languages, and of course Latin.   Orlando Bird I went to a comp and had a similar experience – languages obviously weren't a priority. But the problem was also just that GCSE standards were so low. By those standards, I wasn't bad at French, but in reality, I could barely speak a word. Will modern languages end up becoming the preserve of fee-paying schools, like Latin? Coming up today Catch up on yesterday’s episode of The Daily T where Tim Stanley and Cleo Watson answer the question: Can private schools survive Labour?   Get full access Unlock Britain’s best news app and our award-winning website Enjoy three months’ free access to The Telegraph. Cancel at any time. Subscribe now   Listen Click below to enjoy one of our agenda-setting podcasts   Puzzles Find as many words as you can in today’s Panagram, including the nine-letter solution. Visit Telegraph Puzzles to play a range of head-scratching games, including PlusWord, Sorted, and Quick, Mini or Cryptic Crosswords.   The solution to yesterday’s clue was EMPOWERED. Come back tomorrow for the answer to today’s puzzle.   Newsletters Read and sign up for our newsletters Telegraph Money • Wednesday Want to be richer? 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