“Savers were placed at the heart of Britain’s economic recovery after George Osborne announced the biggest overhaul of pensions for a generation. … The centrepiece of the Chancellor’s fifth Budget was the scrapping of rules that force most Britons to use their pension savings to buy an annuity. … The Budget also contained a sharp rise in the amount that can be saved tax-free in an Isa. Savers will be able to put aside £15,000 annually from July. … Mr Osborne said: ‘The message from this Budget is this: you have earned it, you have saved it, and this Government is on your side.'” – Daily Telegraph
And lots of comment:
> Today:
> Yesterday:
“The Chancellor announced the starting threshold for paying income tax would rise again to £10,500 next year, delivering a £100 tax cut just before the election. … Mr Osborne also confirmed that the threshold at which individuals start paying the higher rate will be raised this year for the first time since the 2010 general election – but by just 1 per cent this year and a further 1 per cent in 2015. … Former Tory Cabinet minister John Redwood welcomed Mr Osborne’s slight raise to the 40p tax threshold but said he should have been much bolder.” – Daily Mail
“He slashed 2p from a pint by cutting Beer Duty by 1p to 53.6p and scrapping a 1p inflation rise. … A pint of cider is 1p cheaper now because the inflation-linked rise has been binned. … He froze the levy on spirits, scrapping a 42p rise on a bottle of whisky — a move partly designed to please Scots ahead of the independence referendum. … Tax on a bottle of wine will now go up by 6p instead of 11p, with an escalator on its levy scrapped. … As The Sun revealed yesterday, the Chancellor also halved Bingo Tax — a move that will delight its three million regular players.” – The Sun (£)
“Manufacturing firms could see their energy costs fall by £7billion. … George Osborne said he would cap taxes on carbon emissions, compensate heavy industry for other green taxes and extend tax breaks for investment. … Together, the measures could save a medium-sized manufacturing business £50,000 a year, the Chancellor told MPs yesterday.” – Daily Mail
“The CBI has claimed that the Budget would ‘put the wind in the sails of business’. … Business received a range of tax breaks and measures designed to boost investment amid criticism of Britain’s record on that front. … Now businesses will receive an allowance of up to £500,000 against corporation tax until at least 2015 – double the amount the measure was increased to back in 2012 – in an attempt to tackle the problem.” – The Independent
> Yesterday: ToryDiary – In spirit at least, Halfon is now the author of Osborne’s Budgets
The welfare budget is to be capped at just under £120billion next year and will then rise only in line with inflation to stop the benefits bill spiralling out of control. … As George Osborne seeks to make further benefit cuts a central election dividing line with Labour, MPs will vote next week on a new system to restrict the amount the state can spend on handouts. … Governments will have to respond to any breach of the cap by cutting welfare in what the Chancellor describes as a ‘limit on the nation’s credit card’.” – Daily Mail
“Motorists are to benefit from a £200 million fund to end the curse of potholes which has worsened in the wake of the severe winter’s torrential rain and floods. … Councils will be able to apply for cash to fund road repairs and fill in the holes. … But while motoring groups and councils welcomed the extra cash, they said it wouldn’t go far enough and was itself likely to disappear just as quickly down a hole.” – Daily Mail
“Delivering his Budget speech, the chancellor said £106m would be made available for postgraduate training centres; £74m to support innovation in stem cells and graphene; and £42m to set up a new Institute for Data Science in honour of Alan Turing, the cryptanalyst and second world war codebreaker.” – Financial Times
“The Budget announcement includes £20m to develop more challenging postgraduate apprenticeships in subjects such as engineering, accounting and technology. Another £170m will be spent on grants for small businesses wanting to take on 16- to 24-year-old apprentices, with the aim of supporting 100,000 more on-the-job trainees over the next two years.” – Financial Times
“Last year 1,000 people a day stopped claiming Jobseeker’s Allowance, with the number of claimants falling at its fastest rate for 16 years. … The Chancellor yesterday hailed the ‘staggering’ fall of 24 per cent, or 363,200, in 12 months. … He also bragged that for the first time in 35 years, our employment rate is higher than America’s.” – Daily Mail
“The Conservatives were under fire last night over a ‘condescending’ pitch for the working class vote – after launching an Internet advert which highlighted Budget cuts to beer and bingo duty. … Conservative Party chairman Grant Shapps took to Twitter last night to launch an advert devised by Tory HQ to highlight Budget measures supposedly aimed at ‘hardworking people’. … The advert – which was immediately dubbed a ‘PR disaster’ – read: ‘Bingo! Cutting the bingo tax and beer duty to help hardworking people do more of the things they enjoy.’” – Daily Mail
“Growth is up, unemployment is down and inflation is back at target, but the Office for Budget Responsibility’s forecasts hint at troubling undercurrents. … Instead of ‘rebalancing’ and ‘deleveraging’ in the wake of the crisis, the OBR envisages an economy in five years’ time that remains a feeble exporter and where households are almost as indebted as they were in 2008 when the boom turned to bust.” – Financial Times
And comment:
> Yesterday: ToryDiary – Your at-a-glance guide to the Budget’s economic and fiscal forecasts
“Ed Miliband’s Budget response flopped yesterday because he had based it on misleading predictions on Twitter, according to Ed Balls. … The Shadow Chancellor said Labour’s leader had to tear up large sections of his speech when rumours of what George Osborne would announce in Parliament proved false. … He said Mr Miliband hastily inserted jibes about Education Secretary Michael Gove’s attack on Etonian influence in Downing Street.” – Daily Mail
> Yesterday:
“David Cameron will today call on European leaders to consider booting Russia out of the G8 over the Ukraine crisis. … It comes after masked Russian troops stormed Ukraine’s naval base in Crimea’s Black Sea port of Sevastopol yesterday. … Ahead of a two-day EU summit in Brussels, the PM yesterday said Europe needed to send a “clear warning” that Russian President Vladimir Putin had gone too far — including possibly kicking Russia out of the G8 group of powerful nations.” – The Sun (£)
And comment:
“A Conservative backbencher has delivered a stinging critique of her party for being in thrall to a ‘metropolitan elite’ and rowing over Boris Johnson’s prospects as if leadership is a ‘bauble to be passed around the old boys’ network’. … Jackie Doyle-Price, MP for the marginal seat of Thurrock, said her party would continue to be seen as out of touch if it kept obsessing over the London mayor’s ambitions rather than addressing issues such as the cost of food, petrol and holidays.” – The Guardian
> Yesterday: Jackie Doyle-Price MP on Comment – Enough! Stop this chatter and distraction about Boris – who appeals only to the metropolitan elite
“Norman Tebbit, the former Conservative Party Chairman, has attacked the coalition’s flagship child care policy and claimed each child should have either a mother or father at home to raise them. … Having more stay-at-home parents would reduce the cost to the taxpayer of coping with family break-ups and ‘subsidising’ families with two working parents, he said. … Lord Tebbit added that the coalition is ‘past its sell-by date’ and should not continue beyond the general election.” – Daily Telegraph
“The body of Tony Benn will rest overnight in Parliament’s chapel before his funeral – an honour only previously given to Baroness Thatcher. … Tory MP Rob Wilson, an aide to the Chancellor, said: ‘This is an error of judgment from the Speaker. Margaret Thatcher was Britain’s first female prime minister, she came from an ordinary background to hold that office and dominate British politics for over a decade. … By contrast, Tony Benn was the son of a hereditary peer whose politics and views were not just rejected by the public but by his own party over two decades before he left Parliament.’” – Daily Mail
“A Labour MP has called for an investigation into the Cardiff hospital where her husband was left to die ‘like a battery hen’ as it faces new allegations of neglect and malpractice. … Ann Clwyd, who warned this week of a crisis in the Welsh NHS, said that the Principality risked its own version of the Mid Staffordshire scandal.” – The Times (£)
“Two Cabinet ministers have appeared to sleep through part of the Budget. … Eric Pickles, the Communities secretary and Jeremy Hunt, the health secretary, were accused of dozing during Chancellor George Osborne’s speech in the Commons.” – Daily Telegraph
“Your choice of a steak or a salad could give away your political views. … People on the right eat more meat than their left-wing friends and colleagues, a study found. … And it’s not just that they like meat more. … According to the researchers, it is because of their belief in the importance of upholding traditions.” – Daily Mail