Budget

‘Comeback Country’ or Brokeback Debt Mountain?

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One pound coin on fluctuating graph. Rate of the pound sterling

This is an extended version of an article appearing in today’s Belfast Telegraph Business Month published 13th April 2015.

Last month the Chancellor of the Exchequer delivered his sixth and perhaps final Budget. It was his most polished delivery to date. After five years of austerity, anyone listening to the 8,000 word speech would have felt uplifted.  “Today, I report on a Britain that is growing, creating jobs and paying its way. We took difficult decisions in the teeth of opposition and it worked – Britain is walking tall again.”  The Chancellor highlighted that last year the UK expanded at a faster rate than any major advanced economy and “more people have jobs in Britain than ever before”. Meanwhile the UK’s much maligned “deficit” as a share of national income has halved over the last five years.

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Time to put economy where our mouth is?

Richard RamseyLeave a comment

Delivering a Budget is as much to do with presentation as it is fiscal substance, and any good Chancellor will have an acute sense of how things are going to play with the media and electorate. This means having up their sleeve a raft of populist policies that will take the limelight away from some of the more unpalatable realities.

Yesterday’s Autumn Statement was no exception, with a disproportionate amount of attention being focused on politically-savvy but relatively insignificant measures such as the abolition of Air Passenger Duty for under-12s.
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