WORK and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith has sensationally quit the Cabinet, launching a savage attack on the "repeated salami-slicing" of the welfare bill.

The former Tory leader's resignation comes amid turmoil engulfing the party over an annual £1 billion cut in disability benefits confirmed by Chancellor George Osborne during Wednesday's Budget.

Mr Duncan Smith said he was "incredibly proud" of the welfare reforms undertaken by the Government over the past five years, stressing that he believed they had helped to "generate record rates of employment and in particular a substantial reduction in workless households".

"I truly believe that we have made changes that will greatly improve the life and chances of the most disadvantaged people in this country and increase their opportunities to thrive," he said.

However, Mr Duncan Smith - who has also found himself at odds with the party leadership over his support for exiting the EU - went on to say that he had "found some of these cuts easier to justify than others" but was "determined to be a team player".

The latest changes to benefits for the disabled were "a compromise too far", he said.

In a parting shot directed at the Chancellor, Mr Duncan Smith added: "While they are defensible in narrow terms, given the continuing deficit, they are not defensible in the way they were placed within a Budget that benefits higher earning taxpayers.

"They should have instead been part of a wider process to engage others in finding the best way to better focus resources on those most in need.

"I am unable to watch passively whilst certain policies are enacted in order to meet the fiscal self imposed restraints that I believe are more and more perceived as distinctly political rather than in the national economic interest.

"Too often my team and I have felt pressured in the immediate run up to a Budget of fiscal event to deliver yet more reductions to the working age benefit bill.

"There has been too much emphasis on money saving exercises and not enough awareness from the Treasury, in particular, that the government's vision of a new welfare-to-work system could not be repeatedly salami-sliced."

The shock resignation came amid rumours that Mr Osborne was preparing an embarrassing retreat over the controversial cuts to assuage an increasingly bitter revolt by Tory MPs.

The Chancellor responded to another wave of criticism over plans to curb Personal Independence Payments (PIP) by insisting yesterday that the Government would consult charities "to make sure we get this right".

A Government source later indicated that ministers wanted to kick the changes into the "long grass" and was "not an integral part of the Budget".

The source added: "We need to take time and get reforms right, and that will mean looking again at these proposals," the source said.

Conservative backbencher Andrew Percy, who was behind a letter to the Chancellor calling for a U-turn, earlier warned that the Government - which has a working majority of just 17 - faces defeat in the Commons if it tried to push through the changes.

The letter has attracted dozens of signatures of support from Tory MPs, but failure to force through the cuts would also throw deeper into doubt the Chancellor's efforts to achieve a £10bn surplus by 2020.

The Institute of Fiscal Studies has claimed that the Chancellor has only a 50 per cent chance of hitting his surplus target, warning that he was "running out of wiggle room" and would require fresh spending cuts or tax rises to meet his target.

Scotland's First Minister, Nicola Sturgeon, responded to news of the resignation on her official Twitter account.

 

The former Conservative Party leader announced his resignation from the Cabinet post in a letter to Prime Minister David Cameron.

Here is the letter in full:

"I am incredibly proud of the welfare reforms that the Government has delivered over the last five years. Those reforms have helped to generate record rates of employment and in particular a substantial reduction in workless households.

"As you know, the advancement of social justice was my driving reason for becoming part of your ministerial team and I continue to be grateful to you for giving me the opportunity to serve.

"You have appointed good colleagues to my department who I have enjoyed working with. It has been a particular privilege to work with excellent civil servants and the outstanding Lord Freud and other ministers including my present team, throughout all of my time at the Department of Work and Pensions.

"I truly believe that we have made changes that will greatly improve the life chances of the most disadvantaged people in this country and increase their opportunities to thrive. A nation's commitment to the least advantaged should include the provision of a generous safety-net but it should also include incentive structures and practical assistance programmes to help them live independently of the state.

"Together, we've made enormous strides towards building a system of social security that gets the balance right between state help and self help.

"Throughout these years, because of the perilous public finances we inherited from the last Labour administration, difficult cuts have been necessary. I have found some of these cuts easier to justify than others but aware of the economic situation and determined to be a team player I have accepted their necessity.

"You are aware that I believe the cuts would have been even fairer to younger families and people of working age if we had been willing to reduce some of the benefits given to better-off pensioners but I have attempted to work within the constraints that you and the Chancellor set.

"I have for some time and rather reluctantly come to believe that the latest changes to benefits to the disabled and the context in which they've been made are, a compromise too far. While they are defensible in narrow terms, given the continuing deficit, they are not defensible in the way they were placed within a Budget that benefits higher earning taxpayers. They should have instead been part of a wider process to engage others in finding the best way to better focus resources on those most in need.

"I am unable to watch passively whilst certain policies are enacted in order to meet the fiscal self imposed restraints that I believe are more and more perceived as distinctly political rather than in the national economic interest.

Too often my team and I have been pressured in the immediate run up to a budget or fiscal event to deliver yet more reductions to the working age benefit bill.

"There has been too much emphasis on money saving exercises and not enough awareness from the Treasury, in particular, that the government's vision of a new welfare-to-work system could not be repeatedly salami-sliced.
"It is therefore with enormous regret that I have decided to resign.

"You should be very proud of what this government has done on deficit reduction, corporate competitiveness, education reforms and devolution of power. I hope as the government goes forward you can look again, however, at the balance of the cuts you have insisted upon and wonder if enough has been done to ensure 'we are all in this together'." 

Iain Duncan Smith bids to stop Tory revolt over disability cuts