Budget 2015: enough to save day for Tories? Don’t bank on it

OBR warns that public spending squeeze will be tougher than anything seen in past five years

The Mole

George Osborne's ‘big rabbit’ – or, at least, medium-sized one - turned out to be the abolition of tax on the first £1,000 of interest earned on savings – an apparent boon to pensioners and those approaching pension age and a clear temptation to vote Tory.

But within minutes of Osborne sitting down after his Budget speech, Radio 4’s Money Box programme was calculating that to earn £1,000 from a typical easy access account paying 1.4 per cent interest, you’d have to have £70,000 in savings. In short, only the well-off would benefit.

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is the pseudonym for a London-based political consultant who writes exclusively for The Week.co.uk.