The chancellor’s budget speech is usually a chance for Philip Hammond to try to shake off his Eeyore reputation and crack a few jokes to lighten the economic news. Last year, he kicked off his speech by having Theresa May hand him some cough sweets, an allusion to the disastrous conference speech she had given weeks before. This year, with the budget falling just before Halloween, Hammond needed to be sure that his delivery did not spook the markets.
It’s 1962 all over again
The chancellor had dug into the history books to mention the last time the budget was delivered on a Monday. He said it was in 1962, when tensions between Russia and the US were rising, the chancellor was a former foreign secretary, and there was a divided cabinet to contend with. Hammond said he was aware of false memory syndrome, but he could swear that he remembered his parents telling their six-year-old son: “Philip, one day that could be you.”
Hammo House of Horrors
Hammond riffed on the timing of the budget being so close to Halloween and on choosing to avoid delivering the nation’s accounts on a Wednesday, speculating on how it might have been framed by the press.
He may not have a future as a subeditor – “Spreadsheet Phil turns Santa Claus” and “Hammo House of Horrors” are not the most inspired of headlines – but it gave him the opportunity to have another slight jibe at his own party. He claimed he would not be avoiding the blood-curdling threats, the anguished wailing and the strange banging of furniture associated with Halloween, since he had been invited to a special meeting of the 1922 Committee, which currently holds the fate of prime minister Theresa May in its hands.
‘There’s a Mr Clegg on line three for you’
One of the set-piece announcements during the speech was the creation of a digital services tax, targeted at large tech firms who operate and make significant sums of money in the UK, but then use tax arrangements that make it hard for the government to raise revenue from their activities.
After stating the proposed details – a levy on tech firms generating over £500m a year worldwide to be introduced in April 2020 – Hammond said, “I am already looking forward to my call from the former leader of the Liberal Democrats”, a reference to former deputy prime minister Nick Clegg’s unexpected new job at Silicon Valley social networking giant Facebook.
Missing rabbits
Chancellors love pulling rabbits out of hats during their budget speeches, but Hammond joked that “some of my star bunnies appear to have escaped a bit early”. Theresa May nodded along as Hammond listed spending initiatives that the government has already made – particularly what he described as a £25bn cash injection for the NHS. Hammond suggested this was one of the main deliveries from this speech, despite being announced four months ago.
Recycling ‘Labour’s great recession’
Referring to himself at one point as “Fiscal Phil”, Hammond was anxious to paint the global banking crisis of 2007-08 as “Labour’s great recession” that the Tories had inherited in government. It has been a familiar attack line over the years. He also made barbed comments about Labour while announcing increased funding for British armed forces.
Hammond also had a joke specifically aimed at shadow chancellor John McDonnell, who recently fell over some rubbish. In the process of announcing a series of environmental investments, including those concerning waste sites, Hammond told McDonnell: “I cannot guarantee that £10m won’t be enough to stop him falling flat on his face in the future.”
The largest laugh in the chamber came from a heckle though. As Hammond’s speech drew to a close, he spoke about next year’s budget, and, to uproar, a cry of “You won’t be here” was heard from the Labour benches.
The rise of social media means that opposition MPs can respond to the chancellor’s budget with their own jibes in real time. Hammond’s announcement of funding to help school budgets to stretch to get “little extras” cut little ice with opposition MPs on Twitter.
Extra money for schools to buy “the little extras they need”. Like teachers?
— Kerry McCarthy (@KerryMP) October 29, 2018
Phil my kids school is talking about shutting early on Fridays because they can't staff it. It's not because they don't have footballs. FFS (the F is not fiscal)
— Jess Phillips (@jessphillips) October 29, 2018
Research backs their verdict. Last year a survey found that 94% of school staff are paying for basic teaching materials like books and stationery themselves.
Phil’s self-deprecation at the despatch box
Hammond’s regular budget shtick is the self-deprecating wisecracks about how boring he is perceived to be. He jokingly suggested that perhaps, in the past, he had given too much detail in his speeches on productivity and technical innovation and this year would leave all that to the published documents. He said he was “sensing the disappointment of my colleagues” and went on to announce some investment in technology.
An outbreak of toilet humour
The longest set of jokes in the budget was a puntastic tour de force as Hammond announced new tax reliefs for businesses with public toilets. Saying that it was “virtually the only announcement in this budget that hasn’t leaked”, Hammond embarked on a series of puns about local authorities finally being able to “relieve themselves”, said he was explaining the policy “for the convenience of the house”, but didn’t want to get “bogged down” on the subject. He did miss the chance to deploy the phrase “spend a penny”, though. Given that it has been a staple of our humour for centuries, Hammond suggested to the groans of the assembled MPs that “at least I’m demonstrating that we are all British”.
