Budget day: Tories accused of finding 'magic money tree' | indy100 | indy100

Today the government has unveiled its latest budget with billions set to be spent on improving public roads, housing, broadband, the NHS and railways, as well as extra funds to combat the spread of coronavirus.

A tax will be introduced on plastic packaging and business rates for pubs will rise to £5000 in 2020. Tax rates on alcohol and fuel will remain the same while £900m will be ploughed into research for nuclear fusion, electric vehicles and space travel.

Scotland will receive £640m, Wales £360m and £210m will be given to Northern Ireland as a part of the first budget delivered by new chancellor Rishi Sunak.

As this is the first budget under the new government and the first outside of the EU many were keen to see what the Tories would be spending money on, especially when there would be much demand for them to offer a firm solution to the coronavirus.

At first glance, reception to Sunak's budget is mostly positive.

But v impressive performance from Sunak. Rose to the challenge, assured. The volte face was an accomplished one.
— Lewis Goodall (@Lewis Goodall) 1583934371

Rishi Sunak currently sounding like he’s been Chancellor for a decade, rather than three weeks.
— (((Dan Hodges))) (@(((Dan Hodges)))) 1583930345

As always, the numbers will all need intense scrutiny before it can be properly assessed, and Coronavirus may yet w… https://t.co/d1Rr8v3DzV
— Piers Morgan (@Piers Morgan) 1583933697

Did Rishi Sunak join the Conservative party by mistake? What a fascinating & potentially excellent budget.
— James Oh Brien (@James Oh Brien) 1583934672

However, as many have picked up on, if a Labour government would have released this sort of budget then the reaction might have been a lot different.

Weird to hear collective orgasm from Tory MPs who would be outraged if this budget was being delivered by Labour
— John Crace (@John Crace) 1583932682

— (@)

If Labour put forward a budget with that sort of spending I am pretty convinced the media would ask how we would pa… https://t.co/SMVMXPLEWj
— Rachael Swindon (@Rachael Swindon) 1583934388

An awful lot of spending in this Budget.. not many tax rises. I wonder how Tory MPs would have reacted had this bee… https://t.co/FGtdkyo17W
— George Parker (@George Parker) 1583932768

But remember that "magic money tree" that Theresa May used to say wasn't real? Remember when there wasn't money for anything? Well it appears that she was wrong after all...

Tory MPs must be relieved to discover the magic money tree exists after all. 💰🌳💰🌳💰🌳 https://t.co/Ny5tsIuFxb
— Pippa Crerar (@Pippa Crerar) 1583937528

Behold the magic money tree https://t.co/OXxJIQx1R0
— Alexander Clarkson (@Alexander Clarkson) 1583933855

Imagine the headlines if this was a Labour budget. “They’re going to crash the economy!” 😱😱😱”Corbyn’s magic money tree!” 😱😱😱
— Hannah Al-Othman (@Hannah Al-Othman) 1583933657

we’ve segued from *there is no magic money tree* to *behold the magic money forest* surprisingly fast
— Jim Pickard (@Jim Pickard) 1583933745

Splashing the cash in this most populist budget of all time! The magic money tree musta had triplets or something :))
— Mandoline 🐦 (@Mandoline 🐦) 1583933066

But in sum: turns out there was a magic money tree, after all.
— Lewis Goodall (@Lewis Goodall) 1583934863

In response, Labour Party leader, Jeremy Corbyn, said that the budget showed that Tory austerity had been a failure and that these measures will go no way to reversing the damage.

The reality is that this is a budget which has an admission of failure - an admission that austerity has been a failed experiment. It didn’t solve our economic problems, but made them worse, that held back our own recovery and failed even in its own terms ...
Today’s measures go nowhere near reversing the damage that has been done to our country ...

Looks like they finally found the "magic money tree" after all.