By rejecting a windfall tax, Truss has painted herself into a corner

theguardian.com:

How grateful will people be about Thursday’s energy announcement? There will be relief, yes: the relief of finding the wrecking ball that was about to hit their home has been suspended. But it does nothing to mend the existing holes in their roof, nor warm cold rooms or fill empty fridges. People will still find themselves stricken with energy bills that have already doubled since last year, with all other bills rising with inflation, along with rents and mortgages. Pay growth has stagnated so long that the Resolution Foundation says it will be back at 2003 levels by next year.

So, political gratitude to Liz Truss for the “handout” that she was against last month may be brief, as voters confront the hard winter ahead.

Who pays the price of capping energy bills? That’s the political question now: do voters care? It seems they do, quite a lot. The polls show three-quarters of Tory voters want a windfall tax, not to pile extra on borrowing to be paid back by taxpayers later. Most voters are outraged at energy company profits and support Labour’s windfall. With her “no windfall” and “no new taxes”, Truss and her team are said to be delighted with the bright red line she has drawn. But has she marked out a territory where a majority of voters are on the other side – as if she has painted the floor, with herself stuck in a small blue corner of the room?

Her attack on Labour as high-tax sounds like the traditional Tory strategy that has won them many an election in the past. But as people examine her tax cuts and see the extent to which the rewards fall on the rich, not the poor, they may not relish them. Her cut in national insurance gifts twice as much of the money to the richest 5% of the population, as the whole bottom half of