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.
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