STEPHEN GLOVER: I’m afraid the chancellor’s budget was cautious and boring just when we needed style.

One of the iron rules about budgets is that people tend to think differently about them once the dust has settled.

A recent example was George Osborne’s so-called ‘omnishambles’ Budget in 2012. It was well received, at least in Tory circles, but it wasn’t long before the paint peeled off. Osborne had foolishly applied 20 percent VAT to the pies.

There may be hidden minibombs waiting to go off in Jeremy Hunt’s Budget, but I suspect he will be remembered as he appeared yesterday: no-nonsense, by no means devoid of good ideas, but neither brave nor highly imaginative.

I doubt it will provide a significant boost to the economy, although of course it is difficult for a single budget to do so. It follows that it will not greatly improve the chances of the Conservatives being re-elected at next year’s general election.

Sure

First the good things. Not least among them was Mr. Hunt’s delivery, which has become less hesitant. In November’s Fall Statement, he resembled a teacher on his first day of school in front of an unsympathetic and potentially unruly class. Yesterday he might have been an affable senior teacher with years of experience.

It seemed safer largely because the situation has improved, though not entirely as a result of government actions. The Foreign Minister revealed that the Office for Budgetary Responsibility (OBR) now believes that the country will not enter a recession this year.

Just five months ago, Bank of England Governor Andrew Bailey warned that the UK was heading into the longest recession on record. The OBR was only slightly less apocalyptic at the time of the Autumn Declaration.

Some may say that since the OBR, famously unreliable, was wrong to prophesy a recession, it may be just as risky to say there isn’t going to be one. Maybe, but big-name organizations agree with his new prediction.

I am certainly going to hopefully hold onto the other OBR forecast revealed yesterday by Mr. Hunt, namely that inflation will fall from its current level of around 10 percent to 2.9 percent by the end of the year. That’s a big jump.

Two encouraging prospects, then, though as I say, the government can’t claim all the credit for them. Still, they are likely to make him a bit more popular, assuming that happens, though the ever-gloomy OBR expects living standards to fall nearly six percent this fiscal year and next.

There were several announcements in the budget statement that deserve our support. Who could disagree with 12 new investment zones? Or keep the energy price guarantee for another three months, although this is unlikely to cost the government much given the falling gas price?

In particular, Mr. Hunt’s pension reforms are sensible. He has removed the lifetime allowance cap on tax-free pension savings, which stood at £1 million, having been lowered to that figure by George Osborne. The idea is to encourage those over 50, especially doctors, to continue working.

The extension of free 30-hour-a-week childcare for working parents in England to cover one and two-year-olds is also welcome, although it won’t be fully implemented until September 2025. Tens of thousands of women should be freed on staff.

I cannot help wondering, however, whether it is right to expand the scheme to include babies as young as nine months. Should a Tory government encourage parents, and particularly mothers, to hand over babies this young to childminders? Maybe I am antediluvian.

Despite that reservation, Mr. Hunt deserves congratulations on these reforms. He is, it should be added, a master of detail, sometimes to absurd extremes. For example, he mentioned providing £1.5 million to repair the Cloddach Bridge in Scotland. A good cause, to be sure, but mentioning it was a case of not seeing the forest for the trees.

I can imagine Mr. Hunt and Rishi Sunak poring over spreadsheets late into the night, probably with a restorative cup of chocolate, while delving into the details in such an impressive way.

And that’s really the difficulty. This was an unimaginative budget. He focused on specific issues without showing a full awareness of the problems that beset us.

Hunt would disagree. He would say that he has put growth at the center of his measurements. But does anyone with common sense think that removing pension taxes or reforming child care alone is going to make a huge difference to growth?

more poor

The OBR seems not to, though of course it may be wrong in its usual way. He forecasts 1.9 percent growth over four years, which is nothing stellar. In fact, it’s quite sad.

In two crucial areas (tax and defense), Hunt showed that despite his ingenious grasp of detail, he has somehow fallen short of the occasion. He is a cautious man.

Income tax was not mentioned, not once. The Chancellor did not remind the House of Commons that the thresholds will be frozen next month, so people (or, in any case, the 63 per cent of adults who pay income tax) will feel much more poor after months of high inflation.

Hunt also ignored those who have been arguing that the Corporate Tax hike planned for April should be reversed. He claimed the UK will continue to have ‘the lowest overall rate in the G7’. He did not say that no other advanced economy is raising corporate taxes.

His new investment allowance (every pound a company invests in IT equipment, plant or machinery will be deductible from taxable profit) doesn’t sound very convincing, either. It is less generous than the scheme it replaces, and may only last three years, possibly less, if Labor wins the election.

Any Tory Chancellor should surely cringe in shame at presiding over taxes that are at their highest in peacetime. It is not an acceptable state of affairs. Hunt offered no hope that it wouldn’t last.

Rampage

Perhaps the most disappointing aspect of the Budget was the meager increase in defense spending. During a big European war, with Russia in an uproar, while China is a growing threat, the government can only find an extra £5bn in two years.

Most of this money will go towards replenishing ordinances sent to Ukraine and building our fleet of nuclear powered submarines, which will take the better part of 20 years. The rest of our depleted navy, the greatly reduced RAF and our dwindling army will receive little or no augmentation. How can that be correct?

It goes without saying that I reject Sir Keir Starmer’s attempt at analysis. He claimed in response to Mr Hunt that “Britain is Europe’s sick man once again”, and that the government is guilty of “controlled decline”.

That’s silly. Our situation is far from serious and much better than what the official soothsayers predicted only a few months ago. But it could be even better, much better, unless of course Labor emerges victorious next year.

This Budget did little or nothing to obviate that terrifying prospect. He was boring, competent and careful when the nation requires strength and imagination. Time, I fear, is running out.