Aspects of the autumn Budget 2021

In normal times (remember them?) the introduction of a brand-new tax to fund health and social care would have formed the centrepiece of a Budget statement. But the prime minister pre-empted that – some might say he shot the chancellor’s fox – with the announcement of the new health and social care levy on 7 September.

Then the chancellor came close to shooting his own fox by the extensive briefing of the highlights of the speech for which he was roundly condemned by the speaker and again before the speech itself by the deputy speaker. Being told off before starting a Budget speech must have been an odd experience for a chancellor. He looked a little sheepish as if he had been caught out copying somebody else’s homework. Somehow one cannot imagine Gladstone being given a dressing down just before one of his epic Budget speeches....