George Osborne

My night of nostalgia with Boris and co.

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Rishi Sunak had a pre-game Twix and a Sprite to prepare for this week’s impressive Budget. I used to have a cup of very sugary tea. It was a tip from our joint mentor, William Hague. It coats the throat in preparation for speaking in a rowdy chamber. Even then my voice would be hoarse by the end of an hour’s Budget statement. It’s hard to convey just how noisy it is standing there with a couple of hundred adults screaming at you from a few feet away. But on Wednesday the House of Commons seemed quieter than it used to be on these big days. I’m not sure why. With taxes going up, spending rising and government intervening in industry, you’d think there would be lots for Labour MPs to shout about.

A strong commitment to the Northern Powerhouse and an increase in the national living wage we introduced are music to my ears. It’s also comforting to see Treasury orthodoxy prevail. That great department doesn’t have a strong view on how much money should be spent, just that it has to be paid for. Getting his neighbour to agree to an increase in national insurance to pay for more NHS spending was no mean feat by Rishi. Geoffrey Howe’s landmark budget of 1981 increased taxes to cut the deficit; so did my emergency budget in 2010. Sound money rather than a smaller state is the guiding star of Conservative chancellors.

On Monday we got stuck in the permanent traffic jam by Stonehenge. Seven years ago, at another spending review, I announced over a billion pounds for a new A303 road tunnel. Nick Clegg rushed down there to claim credit and said it would be built by the end of decade.

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