No 10 also said it was consulting on ways to make online marketplaces more responsible for stopping non-compliant sellers avoiding tax. Pressed on whether she could say the pub policy was fully funded, she conceded the wording would only be accurate in future tense, saying it “will be” fully funded, rather than that it already was. This is not the first Burnham policy to run into funding scrutiny. Matt Vickers, chairman of the Conservative Party, described the pub rates policy as the government’s “third unfunded spending commitment in three days,” and argued ministers had removed a larger, pandemic-era rates discount before offering back a smaller one. A 15 per cent discount for 2026/27 was announced by the previous chancellor in January, with rates due to rise in line with inflation from 2027 to 2029; Burnham’s 20 per cent discount from 2027/28 builds on that.