UK News 17-03-2005 Vote Now, Pay Later who: Gordon Brown what: Gives final budget speech before general election where: House of Commons, LONDON when: Wednesday snippet: "This government and this chancellor have run out of solutions to the problems Britain faces," said Conservative Party leader Michael Howard in the Commons on Wednesday in response to Gordon Brown`s last budget before the expected May 5th general election. "Their only answer is to tax, to spend and to waste - to get people to vote now and pay later." Mr Brown`s budget giveaways included doubling the stamp duty threshold to £120,000 and giving a £200 council tax rebate to every pensionable household. But Mr Howard predicted that these tempting offers were too good to be true. "We can see the sweeteners," he said, quoted in The Sun, "but they hide the crippling tax rises for hard-working families that are inevitable if Labour wins." For education, Mr Brown delivered "a £1.5bn boost for colleges and a new £75-a-week grant to encourage the poorest pupils to stay in school," says The Guardian. He froze petrol duty until September, froze car tax for small and medium-sized vehicles, and extended the tax break on the first £7,000 of savings in ISAs to 2010. But he also added 1p to the cost of a pint on beer, 4p onto a bottle of wine and 7p onto 20 cigarettes. Between now and 2010, 100,000 nurses, teachers and other "key workers" will get help to buy their own homes, says The Sun. "The Government and a mortgage lender will jointly buy 25 per cent of a property, with the homebuyer using a deposit and a mortgage to pay for the other 75 per cent." But the paper`s political editor Trevor Kavanagh warns us to "berware the bribes of March" and notes that shadow chancellor Oliver Letwin has promised even more if the conservatives are elected. "We will see the Chancellor and raise him," says Mr Letwin. Nevertheless, Labour MPs believed "the package would help Labour win a third term at the election expected on 5 May," according to The Independent`s Andrew Grice and Philip Thornton. "Although he stopped short of a giveaway Budget, Mr Brown delighted Labour MPs with eye-catching measures worth about £1.5bn in 2005-06 and £1.1bn the following year, targeted at key electoral groups". "In what has become open rivalry with the Prime Minister, the Chancellor has taken a long stride towards Number 10," says The Telegraph, which sounds a note of admiration for his moxie, if not for his fiscal policy. "Indeed, anyone from overseas and unfamiliar with the complexity of Mr Brown`s ways might assume - on glancing through this Budget - that he already runs the country." [... more]

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