SPRING STATEMENT: Inflation as never seen before

TAHA COBURN-KUTAY: Today’s mini-budget is like giving a sugar candy to please everybody around the Chancellor. Interestingly most cuts come in around 2024 when the country goes for a general election and the Chancellor doesn’t care who bears the brunt of his policies. 

In one of my articles leading up to the 2019 general elections, I had mentioned that no one is questioning the government about the net fiscal deficit and how does the government plan to fill the gap only to see today that the gap has grown further 95.6% of the GDP.

On the one hand, the Chancellor has cut fuel duty by 5p but the national insurance raised to 1.25%. If one was to do the calculations the government coffers will have more money than cutting the fuel duty loss. Most people in the UK use public transport, all train and bus fares are increasing if not increased yet. This fuel duty cut will not benefit those people but the national insurance rise will affect most of them.

The energy prices are increasing and some people have to make tough decisions whether to put food on the table or switch on the heating in their homes.

The income tax base band dropped from 20 to 19% which will take effect in 2024, I will ask people to reread this line and think how does it make sense if the conservative government couldn’t come back to the office in 2024. Who will face the problem of the government coffers receiving less tax?

For businesses, the tax rates will be cut in the autumn budget, how many businesses will even remember such a suggestion was made today.

For all the above reasons, I firmly believe this is an eyewash for the incompetence of the government. This is not a budget of the Century. The cost of living is spiraling and people will have to make tough choices when the effects of war start to show. We will see the prices of basic products like bread, eggs, and cooking oil go up as all these products directly or indirectly come from Ukraine. How does the Chancellor guarantee that this will not affect a common person like me?

(Chairman at http://UKABC.co.uk, TV Presenter, International Speaker, Community Leader)