CLEVER POLITICS

'And finally I announce a 2p reduction in Income Tax from 22 to 20%... the lowest level in 75 years' In my short-lived memory of caring about politics, never has a Budget recieved so much attention.

The norm is usually the predictable 'fags up, booze up', 'the winners, the losers', ooops Brown's got his sums wrong again and thus needs to borrow more money but we shouldn't criticise since he is after all the 'one of the longest serving and successful Chancellors in recent years... overseen the longest period of growth and so forth.'

This year's Budget was evidently different. This was a very 'political' budget, one that in my opinion was very clever and almost ensures Gordon Brown as the next PM (if it wasn't certain already). It was all about 'the 2p drop in income tax'. It was 'political' because in reality, as anyone with half a brain understands, the level of tax people pay has hardly changed.

It was a 'neutral' budget', tax went up in places but went down in others. This was an exercise in demonstrating Brown's New Labour credentials to 'Mondeo Man' and grabbing news coverage. He suceeded!!!

In recent months, the Tories have been able to relentlessly bash away at Brown. The 'road-block' to reform and the 'control freak'. Being the unconfirmed PM in waiting Brown has been restricted to fight back. This year's Budget was Brown's clever retaliation. Economically, nothing has really altered but politically much has. The savvy know little has changed but many people are stupid and when they see at the bottom of their pay-slip and an extra few quid, as of April next year (maybe just before an election), they'll be reassured that Brown is not the Old Labour control freak the Tories want to portray.

Brown has also been compared to Stalin this week: The man who rules the treasury with an iron fist! Not a bad trait when dealing with civil servants, the public might say. For Gordon, this has been a productive week.