Budget 2014

Some of my friends think that politics is boring.

Well, this budget was indeed boring.

But that is a good thing.  For boring, read stable.  Resilient and steady.

Personally, myself and all working people will benefit from the increase in the personal allowance to £10,500.00 (ie the amount you are not taxed on – so if you earn £25,000.00 a year, you will only be taxed on £14,500.00 of that).  Small change but better than tax increases under Labour.

A penny will be knocked off the price of a pint.  Labour would have put your beer tax up, like they always did (not to mention how much they put on fuel duty – do you remember?).

The most striking thing about it, is that 14 months away from the general election, it is of course a political budget, with the aim not only to ensure that traditional or sometime Tory voters that might either be wavering towards UKIP or Labour, will be more minded towards voting Conservative in May 2015, but also to ensure Mr Osborne is well-thought of during his battle with Boris, which if things go tits up for Dave next year, will become very pertinent.

So the allowance before the 40% tax rate has been increased slightly, of course many of those that earn enough to have to pay the 40% tax rate are potential Tory voters.  This is a clear signal for what would happen if the Conservatives are re-elected, ie the squeeze on the middle-income folk will abate.

There were also changes for pensions that may well appeal to older voters (also more likely to vote Tory…or UKIP!) but they are too boring for me to talk about and my readership doesn’t include many people approaching pension age!

Interestingly there are new powers against tax avoiders.

Most importantly though, bingo tax has been halved.

So yeah, it was boring and I don’t really have anything to say about it.  So boring that it should be commended.

I wonder what Omar S thinks?