AN ELECTION row over tax and spending broke out last night as Labour seized on a “gaffe” by a senior Tory who said the party’s promised £4 billion of tax cuts were merely a “downpayment” and there would be more to come.

John Redwood, a member of the shadow cabinet, appeared to breach Michael Howard’s cautious refusal to promise big tax cuts by saying that the Conservatives would aim to reduce taxes much further. He also claimed that, if elected, the Tories’ first budget would make voters £12 billion better off than under Labour.

Labour immediately seized on the comments, which followed last week’s row over the National Health Service, as evidence that their opponents were stuck in their old ways of squeezing spending on vital public services to deliver tax cuts for the better-off.

Treasury ministers said the remarks proved that the Tories were planning a “massive” £35 billion cut in vital public services if they got into power.

Redwood’s comments last night gave Labour a chance to turn the tables on the Tories after Howard put Tony Blair on the back foot during the “battle of Margaret Dixon’s shoulder”, the row over the 69-year-old whose operation has been cancelled seven times.

Redwood called for a flat rate tax of just 20% on income and company earnings as well as keeping stamp duty down to a maximum of 2% in a pamphlet last year before he returned to the shadow cabinet.

Asked if there would be more tax cuts beyond the £4 billion already committed, Redwood said: “It will be more over the lifetime of the parliament. It will be more if all goes well. That’s just a downpayment. That’s just for the first budget . . . It could easily be above £4 billion over the lifetime of the parliament.”

He said the real difference if the Tories were elected would be £12 billion immediately, because Howard would not impose the extra £8 billion of tax rises that his party predicts Gordon Brown will load onto the taxpayer after the election.

The further tax cuts would come from reducing waste and a hoped-for economic boom: “It will come from better management in the public sector and by growth in the economy. If the economy grows well then there will be more scope.”

In a speech today Brown will make great play of Redwood’s remarks on Channel 4’s Morgan & Platell programme. The chancellor is expected to tell Labour’s Scottish conference in Dundee: “Nobody believes anything the Tories say on tax, given their sums don’t add up. The only cut to which they are committed is a massive £35 billion cut in spending on vital public services.”

The chancellor will reinforce that message in the budget in 10 days’ time. Treasury sources say that the fiscal position remains tight and there will be no irresponsible pre-election giveaway.

“Gordon knows that the public would see any tax cuts as a crude bribe,” said one Brown ally. “He will be emphasising that the economy is safe in his hands and that the Tories are making promises they will not be able to keep.”

Treasury sources dismiss talk of a giveaway of £3 billion or more. “You don’t convince people that you are committed to meeting the fiscal rules by giving money away at the first opportunity,” an aide said.

Any small amounts that Brown has at his disposal will be directed to children and pensioners, but the budget’s big theme will be equipping Britain for long-term challenges. Brown told allies that he will take steps to make the economy more flexible and adaptable, even at the risk of courting unpopularity with the unions.

• The NHS may be cancelling more than twice as many operations at short notice as the government acknowledges.

  The figures, disclosed in reports prepared by individual hospital trusts, contradict ministers’ claims that “only” 66,000 operations a year are cancelled. Instead, the figure is estimated to be at least 132,000. The discrepancy arose because the Department of Health counted only the procedures called off within 24 hours of the scheduled operation.

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