we are forecast to meet our 3% eu stability and growth pact target this year for the first time in almost a decade. but i won't hold my breath, mr deputy speaker, for my congratulatory letter from jean—claude junker! laughter now, before you crack open the prosecco, the bad news was not talked about in the budget. it's all about the planned austerity over the next few years. now, here's the graph. this is what is meant to happen to spending on public services. this is spending per head, and it dips several percent from 2015 to 2021. the big gamble is whether those cuts can really be delivered. it's whether we'll stomach them when borrowing is no longer seen as a crisis. what do you think? well, that is the broad brush. but there's a funny thing about budgets — they can become overwhelmed by an argument over one specific measure or other. it happens a lot, and it seems to be happening more quickly than it used to.

and this budget is an example. nick watt reports. we haven't quite heard the first cuckoo, but spring will soon be upon us. as the buds slowly sprout, it's time to prepare for future climates, both sunny and chilly. that was the spirit philip hammond invoked in the lead up to the budget. expect to prepare for troubled times as the uk leads the eu. it actually turned out that spreadsheet phil is so comfortable in his dream job that we witnessed gag a minute phil as he cracked a joke about the last chancellor, who announced the demise of the spring budget. the treasury has helpfully reminded me that i am not the first chancellor to announce the last spring budget. 2a years ago, norman lamont also presented what was billed then as the last spring budget.

what they fail to remind me, mr deputy speaker, was that ten weeks later he was sacked! laughter so wish me luck today! ah, a chancellor who thinks he can deliver a deadly serious budget whilst lightening the mood with some gags at the expense of, well, almost everyone. what could possibly go wrong? when a chancellor faces a continuing hole in the public finances and pressing demands for extra spending, they have to take the tricky step of raising taxes. so why not ask the self—employed to pay a little more in national insurance contributions to bring them into line with the rest of the workforce? all so simple, given that they will be benefiting from the new state pension. all so simple on a treasury spreadsheet. not so simple when your general election manifesto said precisely the opposite. the alternative to that plan is actually putting up taxes,

and i don't want to do that. no increase in national insurance, no national insurance rise. that is our vow. i read the manifesto, as you would expect, since the budget, to have a look at the precise wording and to try and see if there is any way of getting out of the pledge. and as far as i can tell there isn't. it didn't take long for the sleuths of westminster to turn up tory election tweets, pledging no increase in national insurance contributions and taunts about how labour was bound to do just that. they have quite blatantly broken their manifesto pledge. let's remember, they've got form for this. they told us before 2010 that they weren't going to reorganise the nhs, and then as soon as they got into power they organised the biggest reorganisation that the nhs has ever seen. i was flabbergasted at today's announcement doing —— to increase national insurance

the self—employed people. i think it is catastrophic. one of the traditions of budget day briefing by treasury officials outside the commons chamber shortly after the childless is down. today's briefing was a less confident affair, as the chancellor's staff struggled to explain how he had not breached the tory election manifesto. they attempted to justify the move by saying that legislation implementing the election tax commitment had pledged not to raise national insurance contributions, or nics in the jargon on employees. it was silent on the self—employed. the nics shambles was coined not by me but in our office. it is clearly a betrayal of many people who supported the conservative party, people who were self employed, whatever age they might be, people perhaps who after the crash in 2008 found themselves out of work

from an employer and chose to make their own lot and set up their own business. and they are the kind of people who the government should be thankful to. they kept the unemployment figures lower than they were going to be. budget day would not be complete without protesters complaining that their demands have not been met. any grief this chancellor experiences with tax rises will illustrate his central dilemma. in an uncertain time, he still needs to raise revenue. the new cash will help as he injects an extra £2 billion into social care. it is extremely welcome and very important. i was absolutely astonished by the chancellor's figure of i think 2.5 million more people aged over 75 since 2010. 2010 isn't that long ago. i really didn't know the scale of the problem was as big as that. labour was unimpressed. i think the most worrying thing today was that the chancellor proposed a £2 billion

injection into health and social care over three years. that isn't going to even touch the sides. we have an nhs and social care system in a state of extreme crisis, and we have been told that it needs between £8 billion and £15 billion by 2020s. in the chancellor's mind, last spring budget should have been something of a holding operation. it is when the days are closing that he will do the heavy lifting in his first autumn budget, by which time he can assess the first stage of the brexit talks. spring may appear a long way off by then. and nick watt is here. nick, this kind of erupted into quite a controversy through the afternoon, this national insurance, this nics thing. you have detected some unease among ministers? yes, you heard tim farron was very proud of his joke of the day. a none too subtle reference to george osborne's omnishambles

budget of 2012, that fuss over pasty tax. i don't think we are at that level of a shambles. nevertheless there is concern among ministers. 0ne minister said to me that the chancellor had been too confident in all those gags he was making. also this minister said to me, look, the chancellor has really undermined the tories' traditional reputation as the party of the entrepreneur, the party of the self—employed. this minister said to me, we are shooting our own people. and i was told that this idea is going down like a lead balloon on the backbenches. there will be blowback, this minister told me. i was told the government really needs to do a betterjob in admitting that it broke its election manifesto, concede and move on, and then there might be some space for the government to explain the merits in this change. thanks, nick. the chief secretary to the treasury is with me. do you concede you broke the pledge in the manifesto? no, i don't, actually.

you just run through the history of this. in the march budget, before the general election, the then chancellor george osborne said that we were looking to abolish class two nics and reform class four nics. the manifesto talked about not increasing income tax, vat and nics. but by value, 93% of nics is class one, that is employers and employees' nics. those are the main rates, and that's what we focus on and legislate on. do you regret putting it in the manifesto? in the words that you did on page three, we will not raise vat, national insurance contributions or income tax. or, as you put on page seven, we commit to no increases in vat, national insurance contributions or income tax.

i will go on to explain what we have to support this. we focused on the main rates, which is employers and employees... it didn't say main rates. we've said contributions. it implied you would not pay more. you said it on page 27, you said it quite a few times. a conservative government will not increase the rates. that time you said rates, previously you said insurance. nowhere did you say class one. you had it in the front, the back and the middle, but you did not say, by the way, we may reform class two and class four, but the class one rate will not change. we were staying at that time that we were not going to abolish. can ijust make this point? the reason why in a way there's a surprise that there is a controversy over this, we took the legislation through, and at that point the legislation was absolutely explicit. we were talking about class one, which is by value 93% of nics. we didn't include class last two or class four. there were no complaints raised

about that. the labour party said, you have enacted your nics tax proposal. we are entitled to look at what was in the manifesto and not to say, you retrospectively changed what you meant in the manifesto by a piece of legislation. as i say, it was an ongoing point, it was well—known. do you think that the pledge got you some votes when you won the election in 2015? do you think part of that was because you made some pledge on no tax rises? i think in terms of a commitment that we were not going to be increasing vat, income tax or national insurance. all contributions. for the majority fo people, 93% of value is about class one. did it help you win the election? i think in terms of... it's very difficult to say. but, look, i think in terms of the fact that we have said we are not a government that is going to be increasing income tax, vat, or those...

most people, when we had this debate, we would talking about employees' national insurance. you said it five times in your manifesto. the labour party did not have any objection, nor did anybody in parliament. will there be a u—turn on this? clearly there's unease among your colleagues and backbenchers, a lot of people don't like it. can you see this, as in the omnishambles budget, there were reverses? no, and the reason why, people do understand the fairness point. that at a time when... unlike what has happened in the past, when essentially the benefits that the self—employed receive for their contributions, are largely the same as employed people do. it is wrong that employed people pay a lot more in national insurance contributions. that gap should be narrowed. not eliminated, but that gap should be narrowed. i think that fairness argument is one that we obviously need

to make and we need to go out there, there will be people who need to be persuaded. but it's not about being anti self employed. we have done a lot for the self—employed. for example, the self—employed now get the full state pension, the new state pension is worth £1800 per year. that will require saving something like 50 £50,000 worth to benefit from that. that was not the case in the past. we are looking at paternity and maternity. interesting, most of the experts you hear will say it is a perfectly sensible tax change, but this is about the principle of the manifesto. so let's focus on the manifesto. in many respects, your manifesto was criticised at the time for unanswered questions about how you would deliver the cuts and budget you promised. at the time, we can make this commitment on vat and national insurance. tax rises for

hard—working people. insurance. tax rises for ha rd—working people. we insurance. tax rises for hard—working people. we want to reduce wasteful spending, making savings in welfare and cracking down on tax evasion. that's how you are going to achieve a balanced budget. you have failed to do it in these respects and people said you were going to fail. they said you haven't got a plane and you didn't have a plan. what are we meant to do now when your own government, you run the election, on the basis of a ma nifesto the election, on the basis of a manifesto and not just the election, on the basis of a manifesto and notjust national insurance but the whole financial plan? we talk about tax evasion and we have done a lot in terms of what you see as tax evasion. but we are not even close to where we want to be. in the election campaign you said we were five days away from national debt starting to come down. it is not coming down, we are still 370 days away from that coming down. runs through the three... no, you promised a balanced budget by 2018. we don't need to go back to the manifesto and look at the national insurance pledge to see

the whole thing was a charade. what are we meant to do with parties that go into an election saying stuff that sounds good and then not delivering? if i may answer, if that's all right. run through the particular elements. i accept that there are some challenges we face in the public finances, and we discussed last time i was on this programme why the 0br downgraded some of the tax receipt numbers they had and the growth and so on. but if we look in terms of what we are getting an tax evasion, hmrc is more successful than it's ever been. so you claim that you have delivered on the manifesto? when it comes to delivering on welfare reforms, we have found £12.5 billion on welfare. and when it comes on public spending, evan, actually in the last parliament we delivered on our public spending. so your manifesto said from 2019 after a surplus has been

achieved, spending will grow in line with national income. can you make that pledge now? no, the pledge is to cut spending in 2019 and to do so quite severely. there have been changes in the economic circumstances which you and i discussed in some length when i was here in november after the autumn statement, and that has created some challenges for the public finances. there are also some longer—term structural issues with tax receipts and getting that money coming in, which comes back to some of the measures in today's budget, which we are seeking to address, so we have got sustainable tax base, so we can afford to pay for the public services that we need. economists at the time of your tax pledge criticised, hit out at the proposals to ban tax rises as undermining fiscal credibility and leaving little flexibility to deal with shocks. you have just described a load of shocks.

and you didn't have the flexability to deal with them. you now to say that pledges like, we are not going to raise any major tax like you gave in the last election, those are thing of the past, they were a mistake? we will revisit that issue as we get closer to the next general election. what are we meant to do if you say it next time? that is a matter for some time down the line. i think it was pretty clear that when we fought the last general election, our opponents would have been much more willing to raise taxes... if you come back in 2020 and say we are not going to raise taxes and national insurance, can we believe you? what are we meant to do? i come back to the point that we legislated for these measures, we complied with that legislation. i come back to the point, last time i was here, you were saying, you are failing to cut spending this year.

one of the things that has come through from today's numbers is we are succeeding in reducing spending this year, and if we can continue at that rate, we will meet our spending plans in this parliament in the same way that we met them in the last parliament. thank you very much indeed. well, let's see how the budget is going down outside westminster. just some background here: one reason for the buoyant economy over the last year is that households have carried on spending, notwithstanding the warnings of economists them about how bad brexit could be. so, are people confident about their own finances? 0rjust desperate? and is the chancellor seen as a safe pair of hands? well, naga has been finding out. brentwood, essex. a thriving suburban town just outside the london commuter belt, edged with rolling countryside. population, circa 50,000. 59% of whom voted for brexit last year. 0nce home to the chancellor. this is the street philip hammond grew up on,

and we are here to find out if those locally think their boy has done good with his first, and last, spring budget. and whether today's announcements will help make their lives better. christine bennett, a teaching assistant and local school governor. she used to live next door to the man who now holds the red box. we played out a lot together. we always played out in the street. we walked to school together, we walked home together. yes, it was fun, just a fun childhood. i think he's doing all right. i mean, it's early days. i'd like, well, i said education, a bit more money into primary school education. a bit more money into the nhs. today, he has said that he will put doctors, gps, into the a&e departments, and that would help, i suppose. but that's not going to go in for a year. we're short of gps anyway, so i don't know where he's going to find them from. there's more confidence in the chancellor a few doors down.

brian soulsby, retired. voted to leave the eu. thinks mr hammond is the right man to steer the uk economy. i know they call him, is it spreadsheet phil? which is not a bad idea for a chancellor. you actually want somebody who's good with numbers. he's done a sensible budget to start with, with room to manoeuvre if things keep going as they do to give tax cuts in the future. more money for the nhs, that kind of thing, i'm sure it will come. but he has to have his war chest for the brexit, and then who knows, we might get more money from that if we don't need it all. i think there was a lot of pessimism after brexit. and i think there were a lot of things said that were scaremongering. and actually as a country we've shown that it's not really going to affect us. haven't arrived there,

but we're going into it in a very positive way rather than, oh, you know, we're leaving, everything is going to collapse. no, it hasn't and it won't, because we're a great country. just a few streets away, lynn mitchell, a publican for 12 years, has owned this pub for eight. self—employed and an employer. wants the chancellor to make it less of a strain to manage the rising cost of being in business. our national insurance is going up. and our rates will go up. so we haven't really personally got any benefits from it. i can't see that he's done anything for us as business people. not at all. you don't think it's a fair budget for businesses? not for us, no. it will hit us in the pocket. and it won'tjust be me, it'll be everybody that self—employed. because, you know, there's a lot of small businesses out there that are trying to make a living, and all the time you try to make a living, somebody is having

a little dig at you. that's how you feel? yes, we work hard, everybody who's self—employed that i know, they all work hard to make an average living. and that is what it is, an average living. and then the first time somebody‘s, you know, business goes down and they say, right, they are on the goal. but sometimes you're better off on the dole. is that how you see it? yes, you get people, they are on the dole and they turn round and they get this benefit, that benefit, they are having holidays abroad. you ask many self—employed people how many times the year they go on holiday, not many. while there is uncertainty ahead of brexit, stability is key. there are promises of growth, but what philip hammond's former neighbours are wondering is how soon will they feel it. naga munchetty there.

let's look at some of the other things in the budget — or missing from it. our policy editor chris cook is with me. chris, we haven't talked much about social care. it feels like we have been going round in circles on this for a while. what we have today is £1 billion bailout. we have efforts to reorganise the local nhs and local governments, but fundamentally, you can do jazzy things with social care in the medium term, and the government is coming forward with proposals for what it is going to do soon enough on this topic, and we have had dozens of ideas on how to fund social care coming out over decades. but it is actually quite a simple question in the short term. in the short term it is a question of, you have this many old people, they need this much care,

and who is going to pay for it? it is too late to ask them to save for it. absolutely, you could in 20 years ask people to put money away like a pension, but you can't do that now. so another review at another bit of money. another area that feels quite radical, further education, vocational qualifications. vocational education is quite different social care. it is actually very complicated as to why we are not good at it as a country, big cultural and social economic reasons as to how we regulate the labour market, but philip hammond announced today basically half a billion in funding for 16 to 18—year—olds to do technical qualifications. we announce them on a 10—year lease i call and get rid of them, so this is i have to say,

i already feel like i have heard some of this before, but there is money there. —— 10—yearly cycle. this is also coming as the government is putting through 3 million people into an apprenticeship over this parliament, and that is going to be quite radical. there is a big tax rise on business coming in next month, the apprenticeship levy. we are going to have a lot more emphasis on technical education in the next few years. businesses who have never had apprentices before are basically going to have to pay that tax or lose it if they don't take on an apprentice, so big things ahead for further education, and whether it works or not, i am sceptical. chris, thank you very much. the budget gags were mostly at the expense of labour. in fact, it wasn't a good day for them, as the budget came after prime minster‘s questions, which saw some laughs at labour's expense, too. but there is a pattern in politics recently, in which the conservatives mock labour for wanting to borrow too much, and then in power implement something closer to the labour plan than their own. and right now labour has a fiscal

credibility rule that would avoid most of the painful cuts to come over the next few years. i'm joined by peter dowd, the shadow secretary to the treasury. the labour equivalent of david gauke. your fiscal plan, you would still aim at a balanced, not a balanced budget but a balanced everyday spending budget? yes, we would. at its simplest, yes. the golden rule, quite clear, that we would spend money, day—to—day money, on day—to—day money, we wouldn't be borrowing. and i think if you look at the figures today, it means you would probably have to find something like up to £10 billion, much less than the conservatives have to find that their plans, because they are more ambitious, so if you have to find £10 billion of extra spending cuts or tax rises, what is labour's big idea for making that fit? the government have made choices in relation to tax cuts, corporation

tax, bankers levy, in heritage stacks, corporate gains tax. that is a choice we have made in that. we would not have made the same choices. —— inheritance tax. you put that back? they have made choices, and when we get into a situation, we will make that decision. that is an example of choices. you have got to find by £8 billion to £10 billion. that is one of the ways of doing it. you want more spending from where we are now? the other thing, it has to sort of, you know, the reset button in this one is the whole question of productivity. productivity in this country, we are 36% less productive than the germans, 20% less productive than the french, nine 9% less productive than the italians. -- 996. i have got productivity next on my list.

you are not going to change productivity in five years, that is a 30 year plan. of course, but at the end of the day, the government have said they are going to get rid of the deficit in five years, then it went to ten years, now it has gone to 15 years. but what are you going to do? you are being very clever here about not saying what you are going to do. with the greatest respect, the government had 15, they have had 15 years to get rid of the deficit, for you to push us into, what are we going to do in five years? it is your fiscal credibility plan, not mine. you said you will balance the books in five years' time. i am not going to lay it out in advance. they are examples that i have given you that labour would get into. 0k, what is your productivity plan? the longer term thing about getting the british nation being more productive. interestingly enough, the government has a national investment plan of

£1180 billion, almost £500 billion. the point that you made before is the opposite. when the tories coming with a plan that is £1180 billion, half of it paid for by the private sector, labour come up with the same plan and we get told that we are being irresponsible, how are we going to pay for it? we would be doing in a way what the tories are doing, we will be investing. right, and on nics, which has been the controversial issue of the day, national insurance contributions going up for the self—employed. it is progressive, isn't it? it is taking from the lesser of, giving to them and taking from the rich. —— off. it may well be, but there is sort of a contract here with the taxpayer. they said they weren't going to raise national insurance contributions, and they broke the contract. the issue at the end of the day, there is a difference between unilaterally

breaking the contract and deciding through a review process where you engage with people how that might alter and change. the other thing is, it seems to me that they are taxing people on low paid and not necessarily taxing the companies themselves. i want to finish with a word about your reader. in the commons today, it did feel quite a lot of the time that ridicule was kind of the mood of the occasion. i just wonder what it felt like to use it in there, with the other party laughing at your party. in a sense laughing at the party because it doesn't feel credible as an opposition. we have have a perfectly sensible conversation. what outrages me is that they are all laughing today, and that the same time they are increasing taxes on people, they are not sorting out the social care problem. they aren't sorting out the skills problem or the nhs, and they can sit there and laugh when that sort of situation faces the country, it's absolutely disgraceful. peter dowd, thank you. let's have a dissection of the day

with a large panel who are each going to give us one takeaway from the budget. i'm with rupert harrison, who is portfolio manager of multi—asset strategies at black rock investments and was an advisor to george osborne between 2006 and 2015. we have a professor in the economics of innovation and public value. the financial times' editor lionel barber. good evening, all. ok, you have one takeaway each. rupert, let's start with yours. if i'm allowed two... no, one! i think philip hammond continued to get it spot—on. he is in an incredibly difficult position. your takeaway, come on! when it comes to caution on public finances and investment in the long term, he is making the right judgment.

i think a lot of the focus inevitably tomorrow on the front pages is going to be this national insurance rise, that's the risk he has taken. i think it is a sensible change. you can defend the fact that the world is changing, that more and more people are choosing to be self—employed, the margin between employment and self—employment is much less well—defined than it used to be so therefore does it make sense to have these different rates. he has made it progressive, so i think you can defend it. the one thing we can definitely take away, it is unlikely we are facing a snap election. if you are planning a snap election, you don't tend to do sensible but difficult tax changes. is there anybody here who wants to say, forgetting the manifesto breach, say that this is the wrong thing to do? or is it the right thing to do, marina? it depends how you do it. the fact that companies pay 13.8% fornational insurance for non—self—employed workers and zero for self—employed workers would have been one way to do that,

as opposed to hitting the workers themselves. and also, you know, we have the lowest rate of capital gains, of corporate income tax. there is no evidence whatsoever that those rates affect business investment. they affect profits. where is the ft on the national insurance change? we have come out in the economic principle of raising the nic charge because we do think — we buy the fairness argument. we also think, if you look at the way that the labour market is changing, you can understand that. but the politics is a different question. my one takeaway... i haven't asked you your takeaway, i'm going to go to ruth first! we will get to all of you. my takeaway, basically the overall budget was right in its fiscal strategy. it was not a giveaway budget, it was a neutral budget. i think to be cautious at this moment was correct. my real takeaway is yet again these forecasting bodies have got it wrong.

i remember, i actually wrote something for the financial times after the autumn statement saying that forecasters have been too pessimistic about the reaction of the economy to the brexit vote. and so far, i'm right, but i may be wrong further out. what is interesting is that the 0br has actually obviously upgraded its growth for 2017 from 1.4% to 2%. and then they have slightly downgraded it for the rest of the period. i think that's perfectly valid. you know, as the recovery is getting a little bit long in the truth, —— longer in the tooth, we have had this recovery since 2009, unless there is a real spurt in productivity growth think the economy will slow down. the short—term forecast bounces up and down. the medium—term forecast, we are going to be where we were going to be, isn't that right? the forecast is more or less steady as she goes until 2020. crucially, sticking to the judgment that there is a longer term impact of brexit, that is still there in the numbers. ruth might disagree,

but the 0br sticking to thatjudgment. they have had to make random assumptions about all of that. what is your takeaway? well, first of all we should be caring about the sources of growth. whether growth goes up or down by half a percentage point is less important than what is actually driving it, and what continues to drive growth in the uk is consumption. and that consumption, as your programme showed before, is spending, but how the spending is being financed is through credit cards, personal debt. so the ratio between personal, not public, the ration between personal, private debt and disposable income is back to record levels before the crisis. the big question with brexit is will it help or hurt that and the investment that will fall by from the private sector, when brexit happens, it hasn't happened, by the way, but when it happens, the fall in public investment

that has been coming from the european union to the figure of between 8 and 9 billion between 2007 to 2014 just coming from the research money that now we are starting to gradually increase, you know, we need to figure that out. so the investment is your main thing, isn't it? the recovery of the economy... well, sources of growth, that's what matters. business is not investing enough, and they will invest less after brexit. the fact that we didn't hear the word brexit. you don't know that. let me have one more bite on the self—employed. the problem is that the government hasn't really reconciled — they haven't given a good account of how it is that they are praising in effect the great british revolution, where you have got 40% or more of the newjobs created since the global financial crisis being self—employed jobs.

if we are threatening to talk about turning britain into singapore on the thames, it doesn't quite match. i want you to respond to this one about investment. i will let you have yours. i don't want to rush through. do you agree that investment is a problem, it is a brexit effect that is maybe growing? there are other countries apart from european countries that are coming to britain and creating jobs, not least japan, china and others. but, where mariana is right is that there are some signs that, yes, household debt is rising quite quickly, especially over the last 12 months. whereas business investment by contrast is sort of slowing down. and that's a worry. that is the pessimist‘s tale. if you look at unsecured consumer... i am an optimist. there is data out there, that one can look at it. you know what, i look at it! and i'm going to tell you some data. 0n the unsecured consumer credit is not back at the levels

of 2008 yet. it is certainly growing quite quickly, 10% year on year, and i accept the fact that that is partly driving consumption growth, which is perhaps not the whole story. a lot of that is because of what is happening in the car industry. if you look at total consumer debt, including all of the secured debt, it's up about 4% year on year. this is quite important, because we have changed the way that we buy cars and we rent them now instead of buying them, and it counts as debt. the assets look in good shape. this is unsustainable consumption, it can't go on forever but it can go on for quite a long time. that's mariana's point. when you have real incomes that have not been increasing, you have to take out debt in order to stay put. lionel has been desperate to get his takeaway, what is it? the wisdom that chancellor hammond showed last year in ditching george osborne's fiscal framework,

which was very smart politics, ie boxing the labour party into the position where they look, you know, show your fiscal responsibility, but not good economics, it didn't make any real sense to aim for a surplus at the end of parliament. now, having ditched that, he's got some room. and so it's good economics, much better economics, and that's why we are in a better position and why will have £26 billion by the end of the parliament as an insurance policy. but that's based on a lot of steep spending cuts. rupert, you were there with lord 0sborne, making those plans. did you agree it was the right thing? i think it is the right thing to aim for. because we have high levels of debt and a large banking system and we are dependent on inflows of capital to sustain the way

that we live, and therefore it is complacent to say that we can just afford to get that debt down very slowly. in normal times, you would want to be doing that a bit more quickly, which is what running a surplus means. however, right now, we are facing a very uncertain time in the next two years. i think philip hammond was right to push that. we are sailing around with no physical view, target or anchor at all. what should it be? labour's policy... he wants to achieve a surplus as soon as is, that is what everybody seems to be contending with. he has got an anchor, but it is not very tough. he is talking about cyclically—adjusted borrowing being 2% of gdp by 2020, i have been pressing that all night. joking apart, that is a very loose target. and of course, because the 0br is forecasting it will only be 0.9% of gdp, that gives him this quote... none of this actually matters. there is no empirical evidence. the debt to gdp ratio in the uk is not abnormally high compared to other advanced countries. what actually matters

is what you are investing in. the us after the prices in 2009 had a 10% deficit but invested that in areas that today is producing growth. it depends what you're doing. we need to leave it there. thank you, all. that's it for tonight, on the day of a budget speech heavy on gags and light on the traditional rabbits out of hats. it sort of reminded us of this. we use a new method altogether. here we go. a rabbit from a hat. new method. invented by me. and it baffles millions, this, you know. when you get the rabbit, it does, anyway. can't find the rabbit. applause what i say is switch to plan b.

good evening. we could do with a plan b because it has been miserable for many of us, with cloud and rain topping and tailing the country. it is an improving picture for tomorrow. we had sharp showers in the far north, with drizzly outbreaks of rain to the south. they both continue through the night. the best of the sunshine sandwiched between the two but that's where we have clearer skies through the night. showers continue into the far north i suspect. it will also be dull and north i suspect. it will also be dulland damp and north i suspect. it will also be dull and damp and grab towards the south, with coastal and hill fog. 0vernight lows into double figures, but in the far north it will be a chilly end to the night, with a scattering of showers still falling as snow to the tops of the mountains. we start off with a frequent rash of showers to the

north, cloud and damp and drizzly weather continuing to the isles of scilly and cornwall. lingering for much of the day. the same for the channel isles. further south at their amount of cloud hopefully that will break up today and for much of central, northern and parts of wales it will be a beautiful day in prospect. northern ireland, glorious pretty much from the word go. a scattering of showers into scotland and breezy with it. a chilly start. through the day the showers are likely to be up into the far north of scotland. we keep clear skies and decent spells of sunshine. far south—west, cloudy and drizzly through the afternoon. temperatures will respond. up as high as 10— 13 degrees. we could see 16 in the far south—east corner. that's 61 in terms of fahrenheit. through the night we could have a touch of chilly weather across the far east. sheltered, light frost. cloud and

rain gathering in the west and all change by friday. more cloud around, showery outbreaks of rain and back to square one. 7— 13 the overall higher. there will be a change into the weekend and that's because the southerly winds that all the mild, cloudy conditions is as. a westerly wind kicks in. that will bring cooler air. at times it will bring more sunshine. there will be some rain around at the weekend and it will feel noticeably fresher. but all in all it is looking bad. if you are in the sun, with a little bit of warmth, it will feel almost springlike. hello everyone. i am rico hizon in singapore. 0ur hello everyone. i am rico hizon in singapore. our top stories: hello everyone. i am rico hizon in singapore. 0urtop stories: north korea's leader is not rational. blood words from america as the world reacts to recent lustig missile tests. this is not a rational person, who has not had rational person, who has not had rational acts, who is not thinking clearly. the white house promises to

get tough on people who leaked classified information. this after of documents said to detail caa hacking tools published online is. i am karin giannone in london. islamic state gunmen dressed as manic storm a military hospital in kabul, killing 30 people. samsung's chief, jay y lee, goes on trial accused of corruption. we get the