Rishi Sunak's threat to deprived areas shows what Tories 'really think', says MP
A Black Country MP has slammed Rishi Sunak for threatening to take cash out of deprived areas to support affluent towns.
Speaking to Conservative members in Tunbridge Wells, the outsider in the Tory leadership contest said his party had inherited a "bunch of formulas" from Labour that "shoved all the funding into deprived urban areas".
As Chancellor he had "started the work of undoing that," he added.
Wolverhampton South East MP Pat McFadden, Labour's Shadow Treasury Secretary, was among those to criticise Mr Sunak's comments.
Referencing a video clip of the speech, Mr McFadden said: "Think of the funding taken from areas like Wolverhampton and the rest of the Black Country since the Tories came in to office 12 years ago.
"Then look at this and see what they really think where spending should go."
Mr Sunak has since moved to clarify his comments, which came as his struggling leadership campaign teetered on the brink of falling apart.
He said he was making the point that people who needed help were not "just limited to big urban areas" and could be found in towns across the UK and in rural areas.
"Our funding formulas that failed to recognise that are out of date and needed changing," he said.
Mr Sunak, who together with his wife commands a fortune of £730million, is trailing behind Liz Truss in the Tory leadership polls and is the rank outsider with the bookies.
Foreign Secretary Ms Truss has pledged a review of levelling up cash as part of plans to regions such as the West Midlands.
