The Budget that never really gives

The Budget- an English spectacle that never really gives.

It's as English as tea, the Queen, Buckingham Palace, red post boxes, country fairs, Maypole dancing, warm beer, roast beef and Yorkshire pudding, the Trooping of the Colour, vicars standing outside beautiful medieval churches and pubs on every corner of your street or road.

The Budget never takes us by complete surprise because most of us can normally see it coming from miles away. It normally arrives with the first show of daffodils on some heaven sent day at the beginning of March. Some of us can almost hear those distant bunny rabbits that herald the first signs of Easter. The Budget seems to fall at roughly that moment when most of us find that our pockets aren't quite as full as they used to be. The Budget loves to play games with our emotions because money is always at the forefront of our minds.

And yet here we were again. The Chancellor of Exchequer,  resplendent in smart suit, shirt and tie and the famous red briefcase now takes centre stage.  The said briefcase used to be black but is now red because somebody in the higher echelons of Government fancied a change of colour. It used to be black but somebody in the wood panelled lobbies of the House of Commons had a sudden change of heart. Besides that black suitcase was beginning to look a bit battered and bruised perhaps the result of constant wear and tear and general misuse.

So it was that the black Budget briefcase soldiered on throughout the years permanently scratched and desperate for some tender loving care. Maybe it had been dropped repeatedly on elegant Downing Street staircases or just thrown carelessly into the back seat of that prominently black car just before the Budget.

Amid all the pomp and pageantry of British life the Budget features in the political calendar rather like some important business document that has to be dealt with most efficiently. Some of us have never been affected by the Budget because none of my family either drink or smoke and taxes are something that the taxman takes great delight in tackling.

Philip Hammond today stood in Downing Street rather like the very model of officialdom. Hammond looked very trim, proper and athletic looking. He reminded you of the sixth form teacher who tells you that you need to study and swot up on a thousand French verbs. Hammond looked confident and businesslike which we've come to expect of previous Chancellors of the Exchequer. And inside that red briefcase were all of those financial secrets and mysteries that only become abundantly clear on Budget day.

Much to my shame and embarrassment I could never get my head around money, balance sheets, lists of figures or all of those essential values and prices that are very much the jargon of the City high flier. I hated Maths at school and in later years could never understand the complexities of algebra or logarithms or algorithms. But when somebody mentioned Maths or money I cowered away shame facedly in the corner barely able to fathom the intricate workings of finance.

But the Budget is the one day in our lives when we all wrestle with our disposable income, assessing the merits or drawbacks of smoking, drinking and driving in roughly that order. These are three fundamental domestic concerns on Budget day. Do we kick the fags into touch, knock  booze on the head or just give up on any of the indulgences that make our every day lives so worth living? Do we keep drinking, smoking and driving because we can still afford all three of these vital pleasures or do we just wake up tomorrow morning and decide that all of them are just too expensive?

Under the colourful stewardship of Margaret Thatcher there was never a dull moment. Thatcher became the Milk Snatcher who deprived all children of their daily fix of calcium. Or so it seemed.  No Milk Today was the prevailing message from a Prime Minister who seemed to divide the whole of Britain. Then three million unemployed confronted Mrs T with what must have seemed an insoluble problem. Then she took on the full and formidable might of the mining industry and won seemingly conclusively.

But Thatcher did give us three very charismatic Chancellors of the Exchequers. There was Leon Brittan, Nigel Lawson and the indomitable Kenneth Clarke. All three men would boldly open up that black door, display either the red or black briefcase to a hugely expectant Press and public always smiling broadly for the cameras.  None of us held our breath because we just knew that by the end of the Budget annoucement a majority of us would be sighing heavily or cursing under our breath.

Every year we seem to get the familiar barrage of complaints about the rate of capital tax relief, National Insurance contributions, taxes on everything that breath or move and a general list of everything that seems totally unfair. There are those staggeringly complicated statements about the rising cost of living and the unavoidable price hikes on everything from garden hoses to bicycle pumps. On second thoughts this may not be the case.

Then there are Britain's motorists, increasing rapidly by the minute, month and week. British motorways and roads are perhaps more congested and full to bursting point than ever before. And yet every year motorists understandably get hot and bothered because they, quite literally, can't move anymore. The road arteries are clogged and almost suffocated by huge and hulking lorries, millions of cars constantly stopping and starting in endless traffic jams.

And quite inevitably motorists always seem to get it in the neck. Petrol stations around the whole of Britain privately dreaded the fall out of the annual Budget. The price of petrol had been unbearably hiked up to some crazily extortionate sum. Men and women all over the UK throw their hands up in horror, gnashing their teeth and seething with fury at the unbelievable injustice of it all.

As a non motorist and somebody who never really embraced the Top Gear culture I  have nothing but the deepest sympathy for you all. Quite apart from all of the regulation costs of maintenance of your car it seems like a constant battle against the odds. But year after year it does seem to get worse and possibly unmanageable.

Still year after year the price of petrol soars through the car roof and temperatures begin to rise exponentially on the roads. How to look after your Toyota, Volvo or Mercedes when the very fuel that keeps it going is just unfeasibly dear. I have nothing but unqualified admiration for today's motorist.

When Ken Clarke was the Chancellor it became readily apparent that Clarke simply couldn't function on Budget day without his trusty whisky by his side. When Clarke began to sweat under the whole burdensome weight and intensity of the day, he would swig back his alcoholic friend and re-assure the whole of the nation that booze was still morally and spiritually refreshing. Clarke was nicknamed  the Hush Puppy slipper Chancellor because he always looked relaxed. Now how was the Budget for you? Alcohol hey! Mine's a shandy lager. On second thoughts make that an orange juice.