An eight year squeeze on public spending is now widely recognised as "a huge mistake", the co-leader of the Green Party has argued.
Speaking during a visit to Solihull at the weekend, Siân Berry said that she had seen first-hand the pressure that had been placed on council budgets around the country.
As both a Camden councillor and member of the London Assembly she argued that the current climate required policies which would open up new sources of revenue and find "clever ways to pay themselves back".
She believed, however, that opinion had shifted against the cuts in spending which were first ushered in almost a decade ago.
"At national level we're arguing against austerity, we're arguing to increase taxes on the richest people to help pay for public services, because that's what society should do," she said.
"You may remember [in 2015] our party political broadcast was people singing - all the other parties singing in concert about austerity and we're the only one saying 'hang on, we should be investing in society'.
"Now I think everyone apart from the Conservatives would argue that austerity was a huge mistake. And even they are rolling back, [with] Theresa May saying 'austerity is over'.
"We need to see some actual signs of that, but she's at least saying, acknowledging, that public services have been too squeezed."
HS2 is 'still cancelable'
One spending commitment the Greens have been highly critical of is the HS2 rail link - a scheme that the leadership still believed there was a chance of bringing to a halt.
"It's quite well advanced in terms of planning, but actually in terms of implementation it's still cancelable," said Ms Berry, who previously worked for the Campaign for Better Transport.
"There's plenty of opportunities, still, to cancel it. And most of the money hasn't been spent."
The party instead wants investment in local transport networks, having criticised "horrific" cuts to bus services around the country.
"The amount that is being wasted is absolutely colossal, it's hundreds of millions for every town to be spent on local transport if you took the HS2 budget.
"And yet the way they decide on transport investment focuses so much on money and profit and not as much on daily lives and well-being and health of people.
"I don't even know how I would spend hundreds of millions on sustainable transport, because it's not all that expensive to sort out. But you can imagine the difference it could make."
Why was she visiting Solihull?
Elected last month and sharing leadership duties with fellow London councillor Jonathan Bartley, Ms Berry has twice been a mayoral candidate in the capital.
The 44-year-old's trip up on the Chiltern Line saw her meeting residents in the Shirley area, who are campaigning against the proposed development of green belt land.
The protection of these spaces has been another priority for the party, although Solihull's Conservative administration has accused their political opponents of trying to "have their cake and eat it" on the issue.
Speaking at a cabinet session over the summer, Leader of the Council, Cllr Bob Sleigh, said: "Some parties in this authority seemingly want it both ways and quite frankly you can't do that."
On housing, Ms Berry said: "We want new homes just as much as anybody, but we want them in the right place and not just for profit."
Since winning a first seat in Smith's Wood ten years ago, Solihull has been one of the Greens' major success stories nationally - they have replaced the Liberal Democrats as the official opposition and now rank among the party's largest groupings in England.
The third national party
Ms Berry - who has said she wants the Greens to become the nation's third party - described the gains locally as "inspirational" and said they proved the party could establish a strong presence in Conservative-run authorities.
"More traditionally we've built up large council groups in places like Norwich, places like Brighton and Oxford where there has been a Labour city council. It's a really interesting case study Solihull."
In recent weeks, however, the party locally has come under fire from Tory councillors following the emergence of previous campaign guidelines for engaging with BNP voters.
The issue ignited some heated debates on social media and was even raised by Solihull MP's, Julian Knight, at Prime Minister's Questions. He said: "There is no place for pandering to racism in my town or in our politics."
Responding to the criticism, Ms Berry said: "Obviously that was an out-of-date manual, because very, very few people now tell us on the doorstep that they're planning to vote BNP.
"But we knock on everyone's door, so we're bound to find people who have fringe views and we have to have a strategy for what to do when we meet those people. Our Green members are very passionately anti-racist."
She also argued that the intervention was "completely disingenuous" after the Tories' own guidance for addressing BNP supporters had also come to light.
Despite last year's snap election seeing smaller parties' share of the vote squeezed and Labour's turn to the left under Jeremy Corbyn encroaching on their traditional support base, Ms Berry argues that the Greens' message is cutting through.
"We've got a steady increase in councillors across the country, we've built up support in new areas, we're breaking through onto new councils all the time," she said.
"That's what people see when we get someone elected. Our voice in the chamber is that third voice that you need to hear.
"You've got that binary two parties, yah-boo, Punch and Judy politics and actually the Greens are putting forward the common sense, forward-looking, green, sustainable ideas which people are seeing as more and more relevant."
