DAVID CAMERON cynically claimed to be a “compassionate” Conservative yesterday after backing yet another Budget that robbed the vulnerable to fund giveaways for the rich.

The Prime Minister reverted to tub-thumping rhetoric to defend his government amid a furious backlash against cuts to disability benefits that even pushed Iain Duncan Smith to resign as work and pensions secretary.

But Labour said his record of punishing the poor spoke for itself and economists warned working families will be “hit hard” by the latest Budget.

Mr Cameron claimed to lead a “modern, compassionate, one-nation Conservative government.”

And he even claimed: “Despite of having to take difficult decisions on the deficit, child poverty, inequality and pensioner poverty are all down.”

He failed to mention that the government had rewritten the definition of child poverty to hide the true extent of the crisis.

Mr Cameron said:“This government will continue to give the highest priority to improving the life chances of the poorest in our country.”

He rubbed salt into the wounds of the worst affected by adding: “None of this would be possible if it wasn’t for the actions of this government and the work of the Chancellor in turning our economy around.”

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn asked why the Prime Minister was “still defending a Budget which has inequality at its core.”

He pointed out that the amount cut from disability benefits on Wednesday was the same as handed out to the rich through cuts to the top rate of capital gains tax and corporation tax.

And Labour issued a lengthy document listing dozens of examples when Mr Cameron had failed to deliver on its rhetoric of “compassionate Conservatism” since taking power in 2010.

From the bedroom tax to the hospital beds shortage, Labour said the government has made the “wrong choices and failed to stand up for the most vulnerable in our society.”

A spokesman said: “When David Cameron became Tory Party leader he promised to change the Conservative Party. He has failed.”

Mr Cameron was dealt a further blow by an Institute for Fiscal Studies report whose title asks: “Are we all in this together?”

It said the government’s tax and benefits policies “have resulted in significant losses for those of working age in the bottom half of the income distribution.”

DENNIS SKINNER MP

David Cameron is fighting for his life.

This is worse than the position that John Major was over Europe.

He’s got a slightly better majority than Major but he didn’t have a referendum looming.

The Tories are capable of doing some crazy things to each other. They kicked Thatcher out like a dog in the night.

In all the 40-odd years I’ve been here it’s the only time a party has actually got rid of its leader overnight.

So just remember anything can happen with this mob. I think it’s got the makings of a very big crisis. It could result in the failure of the government if they play their cards wrong.

So this is a very critical period for Cameron, Osborne and their gang. Osborne has already had eight lives and only a cat has nine. He could qualify as a cat burglar.