Griffith has accused acting Prime Minister Andy Burnham of “making up stories” about his role in the 2022 Liz Truss mini-Budget.
Burnham repeatedly raised Griffith’s time as a Treasury minister during Truss’s short-lived administration when addressing the House of Commons on Tuesday and at Prime Minister’s Questions on Wednesday.
The mini-Budget triggered a surge in gilt yields that contributed to Truss’s abrupt exit from Downing Street, and Burnham has sought to make it a defining issue for the new shadow Chancellor.
Griffith was appointed to the shadow Chancellor role by Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch on Monday, immediately drawing attacks from the government benches over his Treasury record.
Burnham said of the appointment: “What other thing can I say in response to that but God help us.”
Griffith has pushed back firmly, insisting his characterisation as an architect of the mini-Budget is entirely wrong and that the attacks amount to political distraction.
“I was a newly appointed junior minister responsible for financial services regulation – I wasn’t sighted on the budget until it had already gone to print the night before,” Griffith said.
He accused Burnham of attempting to deflect from rising gilt yields and deteriorating market confidence in the government’s own fiscal plans.
“Andy Burnham would love to talk about anything other than the fact that, in his few short days in office, he’s already writing cheques that the government and bond market feel can’t be properly cashed,” Griffith said.
“I’m sure he’d like to talk about many other things, including making up stories about [my] influence in a budget, which is simply not the case,” he added.
Griffith did acknowledge broader failings from that period, saying: “Clearly mistakes were made, but we need to look forward, not backward.”
Government bond yields climbed sharply earlier this week, with the 10-year gilt yield rising as much as 11 basis points to 5.25 per cent amid investor unease over spending plans and inflation expectations.
The 30-year gilt yield hit 5.89 per cent, its highest level since May 1998, with Griffith arguing the moves reflect a loss of confidence in the current government rather than any legacy of the Truss era.
Griffith accused the government of creating “a multi-billion black hole in its finances due to the premium on UK gilts – more than France, Germany, the US, and double the increase Greece has seen over the same period.”
He told City AM: “This is a function of government uncertainty…the government has caused uncertainty by setting out spending plans it hasn’t committed to fund, and by not ruling out tax rises, putting a blanket on confidence across the economy when businesses already suffer from low confidence, low demand, and chilled hiring intentions.”
Griffith urged the government to rule out further tax rises and make meaningful progress on welfare reform “that their backbenchers won’t let them do.”