After delivering a Budget, every Chancellor of the Exchequer lives in terror of seeing it unravel – of big holes appearing in the sums, or having to U-turn on specific measures because they have unintended consequences that were not fully thought through.at the end of October. But there is increasing chatter in Westminster that the Budget may now be unravelling in slow motion.in protest against the decision to apply inheritance tax, albeit at a discounted rate, on agricultural land.
The individual, who sits on several company boards, said that the Budget was already having a “real world application” because the firms had “changed” or “reduced their hiring plans due to the NI hit”. They added: “Our regime is increasingly anti-business, anti-growth, anti-investment and anti-success… Can’t tax your way to growth.”
“It’s a communication issue. They blamed Sue Gray for a lot of it but I am not sure how much she was involved. They waited too long to hold the Budget, announcing in the meantime that they would be cutting the winter fuel payment. It just gives more time to build up attacks.” The dominance of the Chancellor is blamed by some insiders on Starmer’s own lack of political experience – the Prime Minister has spent less than a decade in Parliament after a long career as a lawyer.
Former Royal Navy flagships HMS Albion and HMS Bulwark will be decommissioned as part of a series of money-saving cuts Luron C Wright/PA WireThe MP – who represents a rural constituency – also insisted they had not received a significant postbag relating to the change to inheritance tax for farmers. Of the tax-raising measures in the Budget, they simply said: “We have got to get the money from somewhere.
Even some Conservatives see the troubles of the Government as largely just teething pains that Labour ministers should be able to get over before long. A Tory insider admitted they saw the farming protest as “completely overblown”, but acknowledged that “it’s probably one protest the Tories need to get behind”.