A post-Budget lament by Peter Vaines
You have to feel sorry for Alistair Darling. What could the poor chap do. Raise taxes? Reduce taxes? Increase public spending? Reduce public spending? He would be damned if he did nothing at all. In the end, I am not sure what he did. We had 93 press releases and a mountain of other documents which I suppose just gave him something to deflect the inevitable criticism. David Cameron had of course already written his speech and had his righteous indignation ready to roll, no matter what Mr Darling said. I must say watching Gordon Brown smirking was the least edifying aspect of the whole afternoon. The only person who seems entitled to smirk is Tony Blair who is no doubt sitting in his study at Yale doing his impersonation of Louis XV saying “Après moi, le deluge”.
What about me?
The first question anybody asks about a Budget is how it affects them. Will my tax go up? If not, then it is a good Budget. He can tax everybody else but not me.
