Adam Afriyie on Budget 2013: Prepare for 'bitter disappointment'

For many people, Budgets are when you find out if your pint of beer or bottle of wine is going up in price. It’s the day you fill up your car just in case fuel goes up again. It’s the day you hope to see a tax cut that puts some more cash in your pocket or helps your business grow. Generally it’s a day the average person lives in hope and prepares to be disappointed. That’s the nature of Budget day.

This year is different. They say that this Budget will be highly political. If so, as soon as the doors open, the Commons’ corridors will be buzzing with people feverishly trying to unpack each policy and reverse engineer it. Who was it aimed at? What reaction is it designed to elicit, and from whom? Is it aimed at Labour – giving them no option but to disagree, at their own expense? Is it backbenchers from all parties who, according to many, are just waiting for the right moment to cause trouble? Is it just the start of the beginning of a very long election campaign? Is it for ‘Middle England’, ‘The Tory Right’, ‘Hard-working Families’, ‘The Squeezed Middle’ or any other political cliché you can think of?