Budget chaos - open thread

First things first: Jim wins the compo for most correct guesses at Budget content - by a decent margin, too.  Well done that man.  A (very temporary) job awaits you in Whitehall as official Reeves-whisperer.

The OBR-induced chaos is all very odd.  FFS, Reeves leaked half the Budget, in detail, yesterday - the 'final final' leaks, which once would have been anathema to Parliament and MPs' privileges on being first to learn these things, once jealously defended, not least by successive Speakers.  Hugh Dalton felt obliged to resign in 1947 for less (though some suggest the skids were under him already, and he was glad of the pretext to go).

Anyhow: obviously in the circs, Reeves / Starmer felt they couldn't do anything other than play to their own back-bench gallery.  Feeble politics though it is, I think we all understand.  How much time does it buy them?  Maybe enough, actually:  it might be nicely judged for that specific audience.

On the energy front, the EV levy was inevitable and we may expect it to rise over the years, to replace fuel duty.  (Did any EV user ever imagine otherwise?)  I'm interested in 'pay per mile' - does this mean they are tracking vehicle movements (like Musk and the Chinese do), or is it a self-declared matter on the income tax form?  I would have thought 'pay as metered' would be better - seeing as how smart meters can supposedly detect and discriminate different types of load.  But maybe home charging would represent an easy dodge, even with an SM.

I haven't yet seen the trailed shift of 'green levies' from electricity bills onto general taxation: and I believe they've ditched the idea of scrapping VAT on energy.  Will update when I find out.  Anyhow, it's pretty clear they've completely given up on the £300 bill reductions that were to be achieved via "cheaper renewables".  Not before time: Miliband really does have to ditch that crass rhetoric once and for all, and stop making his DESNZ officials parrot it every time they are asked about bills.

UPDATE:  here's at least part of the energy thing which, I reckon, needs more detail to make total sense of: 

She told the Commons: “The Conservatives’ ECO (energy company obligation) scheme was presented as a plan to tackle fuel poverty. It costs households £1.7 billion a year on their bills and for 97% of families in fuel poverty, the scheme has cost them more than it has saved. It is a failed scheme. “So, I am scrapping that scheme along with taking other legacy costs off bills. And as a result, I can tell you today that, for every family we are keeping our promise to get energy bills down and cut the cost of living with £150 cut from the average household energy bill from April. “Money off bills, and in the pockets of working people. That is my choice ... Not to leave working families to bear the brunt of high prices, like the Tories did. But to get energy costs down now and in the years to come.

So, yeah: no contribution from "cheaper renewables" (- how could there be?)  And on a quick calc (£1.7bn across approx 20m households), that's only £85.  So the remaining £65 must come from some other levy-tweaking.  We need yet another update.

UPDATE 2:  yes, it's a direct transfer of subsidies from bills to general taxation: easy when you know how. 

Energy costs will be reduced by the ending of the Energy Company Obligation, which is currently funded through bills, and through the government funding 75% of the domestic cost of the legacy Renewables Obligation for three years. This is on top of extending the £150 Warm Home Discount to a further 3 million of the poorest households.

So: 150 + 150 = 300 & they'll say they've delivered the £300 reduction promise - for "the poorest households", that is.  BUT, as I keep saying, Mili's manifesto claim was that it would be delivered by cheaper renewables!

UPDATE 3:  the EV tax - eVED - is indeed on a self-certify basis.  It is assumed that the 'honesty' rate will be 98.5%, based on the 1.5% default rate on VED.  Hmm.  That surely has to be optimistic: people pretty much expect to have their number-plate checked by ANPR these days, but who imagimes HMRC will check their milometer?

Have at it all in the comments.

ND