George osborne

The coalition has found the second year of co-habitation more difficult than the first and it will find the coming year even more difficult given that House of Lords reform is on the agenda. But today’s Budget is a reminder of the political benefits of coalition. When George Osborne stands up today and announces, for instance, the reduction in the 50p rate he will do so with the support of two parties. Equally, a minority Tory government wouldn’t have been able to get more spending cuts to help finance a tax cut through parliament. It also seems that there should be measures in the Budget to please both Tory and

The big Budget news tonight is that the personal allowance will rise to £9,205. This is a larger increase than expected and, intriguingly, will be paid for — in part — by a couple of billion more of spending cuts. So, the Lib Dems see considerable progress on their main budget priority, raising the income tax threshold to £10,000, but this will be partially funded by something Tory MPs have been calling for, more spending cuts. It also appears that the coalition will further increase the pace of its corporation tax cuts as well as introducing a new higher rate of stamp duty for £2 million plus houses. There’ll also

In the last few months, there’s been a distinct change in the attitude of the Tories at the heart of government. They are now far more cognisant of just how difficult it is to drive change through the government machine. It is no longer just Steve Hilton and Michael Gove complaining about this, but Osborne and Cameron too. The Chancellor’s particular frustration at the moment is over the pace of planning reform. Osborne and his brains trust believe that simplifying the planning rules is one of the things that they could do to both give the economy a short term stimulus, by encouraging more construction, and improve its long term

In today’s Telegraph, I profile Rupert Harrison, chief economic adviser to George Osborne and the man who’ll do more than anything else (including his boss) to shape next week’s Budget. In the British political system, special advisers are given very little attention — even though the best of them are more influential than the average Cabinet member. The Treasury’s vast power, assembled by Brown, is still there. That can’t be said for Osborne: he spends half his time in Downing St, and is sufficiently detached from the Budget process that he felt able to take a couple of days’ holiday in America last week to jump in the motorcade and

No wonder David Cameron and Barack Obama were being so chummy: they both knew that they could help each other. The Times carries an intriguing story (£) on its front page this morning, about how the two men discussed a plan to get fuel prices down in the UK and the US. The idea is that both countries — and perhaps more — would release some of their oil reserves. And so supply would go up, and prices would come down. As would our reliance on the oil-rich countries of the Middle East. Apparently, we’re some distance from a deal yet, but you can see why both the PM and

Will George Osborne scrap the 50p tax in next week’s Budget? Whispers to this effect have been getting louder, and now the Guardian is saying that it will come back down to 40p, and it makes a lot of sense. As I argued in my Telegraph column a fortnight ago, this is the perfect time to do it. Axing the tax paid by 1 per cent of the population will be unpopular with the remaining 99 per cent, so if Osborne is going to take a political hit he should do so now. Anecdotal evidence of its harmfullness has been getting stronger: multinational companies saying they can’t persuade people to

George Osborne is planning to launch a 100-year bond, says the FT — a sure sign that the Bond Bubble is getting even bigger. These devices are usually used by American universities: the California Institute of Technology issued one at 4.7 per cent, MIT did one at 5.6 per cent, and a few American companies have tried at 6 per cent. The Mexcians sold a billion bucks’ worth of century bonds a while ago at 6.1 per cent, so it would only be a matter of time before HM Treasury — a world leader in, ahem, novel debt vehicles — was going to do the same. The US Treasury Borrowing

When the Beecroft report’s recommendation of ‘Compensated No Fault Dismissal’ was first leaked back in October, Norman Lamb was one of the strongest Lib Dem voices to speak out against it, describing it as ‘madness’. Back then, he was Nick Clegg’s chief of staff. Now, thanks to Chris Huhne’s resignation and Ed Davey’s promotion, he’s in an even better position to prevent this ‘madness’: Employment Minister in the Department for Business. As James has said, the Lib Dem MPs are unanimous in their opposition to Beecroft’s proposals, and until recently it didn’t look like they would be translated into policy at all. But last week, George Osborne threw his weight

A week devoted to Mervyn King and his eight-year reign at the Bank of England sounds like pretty turgid stuff. But, already, the series that has started in the Times (£) this morning — building up to an interview with the man himself — is anything but. Here, for instance, is a snippet from one of its articles, by David Wighton, on how Mr King reacted to the crumbling of Northern Rock: ‘As the plight of Northern Rock and other banks worsened, Sir John Gieve and Paul Tucker were urging Sir Mervyn to act, but he would not budge. “He mocked them as ‘crisis junkies’ and more or less accused