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Philip Hammond put on a shocking display of hypocrisy as he attacked Labour’s borrowing, while presiding over a public debt that has soared by £145billion.

His huge IOU is the biggest amount any Chancellor has racked up in their first year in office since records began.

Just hours before it was revealed, he accused Labour of advocating “borrowing our way out of every problem”.

He said Jeremy Corbyn ’s “socialist fantasy” would leave “billions of extra debt for the next generation to pay off” – while ignoring his own dire record.

When he took over in July 2016, total national debt stood at £1,614.4billion. A year later, it had soared to £1,760.2billion.

(Image: Getty)

Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell said: “The lack of any plan from this weak Tory government is exposed when it comes to the national debt.

As after just one year into the job Philip Hammond has managed to borrow a record amount of money compared to any of his ­predecessors’ first years.”

Lib Dem leader Sir Vince Cable added: “Far from being fundamentally strong as Hammond claims, wages are failing to keep up with inflation, growth is anaemic, and ­business investment has stalled since the referendum.”

State spending has outpaced income by tens of billions of pounds on Mr Hammond’s watch, according to data from the Office for National Statistics.

(Image: SWNS.com)

Revelations about Mr Hammond’s state spending will be an ­embarrassment to Theresa May after No 10 sent crib sheets to ministers this week telling them to boast about their “balanced approach” to Labour’s plans for “more debt”.

But in a speech to ­delegates at the Tory Party conference in Manchester yesterday, Mr Hammond arrogantly called Mr Corbyn “a clear and present danger to our economic prosperity”.

He boasted: “They say politics is about the clash of ideas, so we say to Corbyn… bring it on. Let them put their arguments, let them make their case, we will take them on and we will defeat them.”

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He confirmed plans to spend £10billion to assist home-buyers through the Help to Buy scheme and £400million to improve transport in the North.

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But his speech got a lukewarm reception from business chiefs.

CBI boss Carolyn ­Fairbairn said: “Our economy is under threat. It has moved from the top of the G7 to the bottom. The solution must be for responsible business and ­government to grow our way out of austerity.”