UK Budget

Mr. Osborne is to be congratulated for being the first Chancellor in my memory at least who, when short of money, didn't take it out on drinkers.

The reversal of the planned increase in duty on cider is good news. Cider always bore lower duty because it was classed as an agricultural product (beer wasn't). And yet in the South West of England you can get cider as strong as wine. I knew of a cider house where the glasses had two handles because the drinkers were shaking so much on their first of the day.

Of course the main point of the budget was to keep the financial markets quiet and buying our debt. In this I think Osborne has done enough - as I write 24 hours later the pound has risen over one cent against the euro.

UK Elections (3): The budget

The BBC’s headline ‘Darling pushes broadband for all’ partly summed up the last budget of a man who won’t be kept on even in the unlikely event of his party winning. Trivial and interfering.

For me, however, the headline missed the point. Today’s budget, unable to be an election giveaway (but nevertheless still profligate given its lack of savings) was more than anything else a statement of the man’s political beliefs. The Labour Party and Mr. Darling are, it would appear, about to go into the election avowing the importance of government involvement in our everyday lives. He will tell the banks how to run their business; he believes he can run a seed capital investment fund; he feels that tinkering with the tax system will yield benefits (the big winners, as with all budgets since 1997, are Butterfills Tax Guide, who will be producing another thick volume of irrelevant detail). He wants broadband and bank accounts for all and thinks it is the Government's job to provide them. It is the economics of the 1950s and it must, must be thrown out by the electorate.

Cameron built up his anger and kept it at boiling point for perhaps 20 minutes. It was a good enough speech (not the time when you expect a great one) and did enough.

The real budget will be in June, after the election, when we will hear what is in store for us. It will be grim.

The UK Budget

I think there's only one thing that needs to be said about yesterday's budget. The whole thing is predicated on the willingness of markets to finance the debt. The 240 billion available from the IMF (we are being gently softened up for this, aren't we?) isn't enough to finance a 170 billion a year borrowing habit for very long. So it's credibility in the markets, or the whole pack of cards comes tumbling down.

Now, you don't need to be any kind of financial expert to understand this: lenders expect borrowers to pursue policies such that their loans are going to be repaid.

And Mr Darling is not pursuing such policies. He's still playing politics, hoping to trick the Tories into complaining about a 50% tax band which will raise no new revenue.

Cameron and Osborne now need to look as if they've got a plan, because if they haven't, the jitters will start.