The Channcellor is up, giving his Autumn Statement.
13.41
We finally get a good line from Balls, after talking about Nadine Dorries he says “he’s the Chancellor, can’t someone get him out of here?”
13.38
One nation Klaxon!
Ed Balls says the Government is “certainly not a one-nation government”.
— politicshomeuk (@politicshomeuk) December 5, 2012
13.37
This is a terrible performance from Ed Balls. Like Miliband he is struggling around stats, instead of painting a picture. He is rightly being mocked by a the Government front bench, including endorsing the scrapping of the 3p fuel tax hike that his party set in motion.
13.23
I noticed this too. A bit odd.
Osborne ended with “Thank you” like a rock star instead of “and I commend this statement to the House”
— John Rentoul (@JohnRentoul) December 5, 2012
13.22
Coming to the close. “The public know there are now easy answers”.
Chancellor ends after 50 mins.
13.21
Now Osborne is onto the Lib Dems personal allowance plan. Minimum wage payers see their income tax halved.
13.19
Huge cheer for Robert Halfon. He wins as Chancellor scraps 3pm fuel duty rise to massive cheers. Halfon wearing a very brightly coloured tie to celebrate.
13.14
The 40p rate is a huge issue, hitting people who are comfortable but certainly not ‘rich’. In reality it is a big issue than 50p rate.
£1bn to be raised by hauling more people into 40p tax rate.
— Fraser Nelson (@frasernelson) December 5, 2012
13.11
Benefits – in work as well as out of work – increase less than inflation for 3 years. just 1% #bbceconomy
— Nick Robinson (@bbcnickrobinson) December 5, 2012
13.07
The triple lock Osborne is referring to was a key part of Lib Dem negotiations over the Coalition.
13.02
Worth noting that Osborne is flanked by two Lib Dems, Nick Clegg and Danny Alexander. The Prime Minister is out of shot, just next to them.
12.59
The Sun’s Business Editor is not impressed:
120,000 new homes, ultra-fast broadband – haven’t we heard all this before? #as2012
— steve hawkes (@steve_hawkes) December 5, 2012
12.56
Osborne confirms interesting feature of past 3 yrs: govt has delivered on spending plans despite worse than expected economy. #BBCeconomy
— Stephanie Flanders (@BBCStephanie) December 5, 2012
12.55
basically, this long boring bit of AS can be summed up as: um, this isn’t what we promised. but Keep Buggering On regardless.
— Gaby Hinsliff (@gabyhinsliff) December 5, 2012
12.55
Reference to Frances Maude and “efficiency savings” is first touch on digital strategy of government. They see digital services as key way of saving money and improving public services.
12.54
Osborne says that the Government has proved it can “restore sanity to public finances” but also improve public services.
12.49
Borrowing is up, but Osborne says that OBR forecasts will drop down over the coming years. He says this shows that it is “too big for comfort”. OBR also says that they will which achieve its fiscal mandate.
It will though take 4 years, not 3, to get debt down.
12.44
Osborne says economy is forecast to grow over next view years. Also laying out how unemployment, including youth unemployment, is down.
Are people feeling this though? He hasn’t touched on under employment.