Britain's new Finance Minister Jeremy Hunt said he would show investors that he will repair the country's public finances after the original economic plans of Prime Minister Liz Truss triggered a bond market rout.
"No government can control the markets. No Chancellor should seek to do that," Hunt told BBC television in an interview broadcast on Sunday.
"There is one thing we can do and that's what I'm going to do, which is to show the markets, the world, indeed people watching at home, that we can properly account for every penny of our tax and spending plans."
Investors have sold British government bonds heavily since Sept. 23 when Hunt's predecessor as finance minister, Kwasi Kwarteng, announced a string of unfunded tax cuts.
Truss – who won the leadership of the Conservative Party barely a month ago after promising to slash taxes – fired Kwarteng on Friday and has ditched key parts of the program they agreed together.
But Hunt has said he will go further including increases in taxes as well as a tighter control on public spending.
Asked whether he thought financial markets would have confidence in his plans, Hunt told the BBC: "Well, I think, you know, for people trading the markets, actions speak louder than words."
A first test will come on Monday morning when trading in Britain's battered government bonds resumes without the support of the Bank of England's emergency bond-buying program which expired on Friday.
Senior Conservative members of parliament were reportedly plotting to unseat Truss, possibly within days, aghast at the party's collapse in opinion polls since she replaced Boris Johnson on Sept. 6.
"Hunt takes full control as plotters circle wounded PM," The Sunday Times headlined earlier, while The Observer said: "Tories in talks to oust Truss."
In crisis talks Sunday at the prime minister's country retreat, Hunt and Truss were set to thrash out a new budget plan that he is due to deliver on Oct. 31, just over a month after Kwarteng's botched attempt to drive through a slew of unfunded tax cuts.
"There were mistakes," acknowledged Hunt, whom one ally called the government's new "chief executive" – with Truss relegated to the role of back-seat chairperson.
Hunt said Kwarteng and Truss had erred on Sept. 23 in trying to cut taxes for the highest earners, and tried to "fly blind" in presenting their plan without independent forecasts from the Office for Budget Responsibility.
"The prime minister's recognized that, that's why I'm here," Hunt told Sky News Saturday.
In one of his first acts on taking office Friday, the new chancellor spoke to BoE Governor Andrew Bailey, who has had to stage costly interventions to calm febrile bond markets.
Briefing reporters in Washington, Bailey said on Saturday: "I can tell you there is a very clear and immediate meeting of minds on the importance of stability and (fiscal) sustainability."
U.S. President Joe Biden said Saturday he thought the abandoned tax cut reform was a "mistake."
"I think that the idea of cutting taxes on the super-wealthy at a time when ... I disagreed with the policy, but that's up to Great Britain to make that judgment, not me," he said.
Tax cuts were the centerpiece of the ill-starred budget announced by Kwarteng and Truss.
But they were financed through billions in extra borrowing, causing panic on financial markets at the prospect of higher inflation, which has already left British households in the grip of a cost-of-living crisis.
"We will have some very difficult decisions ahead," Hunt said, warning that "all government departments" face spending curbs including welfare, health and defense.
"And some taxes will not be cut as quickly as people want. Some taxes will go up."
Soon after Hunt's upcoming fiscal statement, the Bank of England will hold its next rate-setting meeting on Nov. 3.
In a separate speech Saturday, Bailey warned anew that the central bank would "not hesitate" to raise rates to keep soaring inflation under control, and said a "stronger response" than previously expected may have to come.
Truss dismissed Kwarteng hours after he had rushed home early from international finance meetings in Washington, and she staged another U-turn in acquiescing to a significant rise in profits tax levied on companies.
At a subsequent Downing Street news conference, the prime minister took only four questions, glancing nervously around the room and delivering terse replies before abruptly leaving after just over eight minutes.
"Robotic, hesitant, tone-deaf, defiant and still utterly convinced of the purity and necessity of her mission, Liz Truss killed off her political career in a matter of minutes," Times columnist Jenni Russell wrote.
Asked why she herself should not resign, Truss said she was "absolutely determined to see through what I have promised" – but her comments only served to depress the pound and bond markets further.
Former Conservative leader William Hague said Truss's premiership now "hangs by a thread," as the Sunday newspapers recounted bitter infighting among party factions.
Up to 100 letters expressing no confidence in Truss have been submitted by Tory lawmakers, the Sunday Times said, with opponents said to be coalescing around her defeated leadership rival Rishi Sunak and another one-time foe, Penny Mordaunt.
But with the opposition Labour party surging in the polls, Welsh Secretary Robert Buckland warned his restive colleagues against "throwing another prime minister to the wolves."
Labour leader Keir Starmer accused Truss of "clinging on," and demanded an early general election.
"The Tories no longer have a mandate from the British people," he tweeted, after Truss became prime minister through the votes of some 80,000 Conservative members – less than 0.2% of the U.K. electorate.
