Voters Call Healey's First Budget the Fairest in Five Years, and Expect Little Change

John Healey's first Budget is the best received on fairness in five years, and a large share of the public still think it will not change their lives. YouGov finds that 45 per cent of adults in Great Britain regard the statement as fair, against 20 per cent who regard it as unfair. That is the strongest fairness score YouGov has recorded for a Budget since March 2021. It is also a long way from a verdict that the country feels better off.

The same survey, of 2,036 adults, taken on 28 and 29 October, finds that 56 per cent expect no real difference for their family, and 49 per cent expect no real difference for the country. Seventy-four per cent think the economy is in a bad state. Belief that the government is managing the economy well has risen from 15 per cent last November to 31 per cent. A majority, 55 per cent, still think it is managing the economy badly. Markets opened lower this morning, with oil back above 106 dollars and the Bank of England two days away.

Who thinks it was fair

The fairness number is not only a Labour number. Two thirds of 2024 Labour voters, 66 per cent, call the Budget fair. So do 59 per cent of Liberal Democrat voters and 54 per cent of Green voters. Conservatives split almost evenly, 29 per cent fair and 30 per cent unfair. Reform UK voters are the clear exception: 41 per cent call it unfair, and 24 per cent call it fair.

That is Ruth Curtice, chief executive of the Resolution Foundation, who gives evidence to MPs this morning. She has said families receiving help could still face higher energy bills than in the last shock.

Most of the headline measures are judged the right thing to do for now. The exception YouGov picks out is the higher tax on income from property and from savings interest. That is one of the rises that took the tax take up by more than 7 billion pounds over three years, alongside the bank surcharge. The giveaway that was meant to be noticed, a payment worth about 2.6 billion pounds for some 20 million households, has not, on these numbers, persuaded people that the household books will look different. A separate City AM and Freshwater Strategy poll, published in the early hours, finds a similar shrug: about half expect no difference to the economy, with 24 per cent saying it will improve things and 22 per cent saying it will make them worse.

What MPs will ask at 11.30am

The House sits from 11.30am with oral questions to the Chancellor and his team. The order paper runs from the infected blood compensation scheme, through the cost of living, borrowing, high streets, hospitality, apprenticeships and growth in Scotland, Wales and English towns. Claire Young asks about the Budget's effect on household living costs. Andrew Rosindell asks about government borrowing. Will Forster asks what has been done to reduce the cost of living. Those are the questions the poll has already answered from outside the chamber.

After questions, and a ten-minute rule motion from Esther McVey on food labelling, the House is due to finish the Budget debate. The four-day argument ends in the Ways and Means resolutions that let a Finance Bill be brought in. Only the income tax charge motion can be amended. The political claim Healey has to defend is the one he made last Wednesday: a 100 pound energy payment, a bank surcharge up from 3 per cent to 6 per cent, and a package his own side's former think tank called scattergun.

The economists go first

Before the Chancellor stands up, the Treasury Committee hears four outside witnesses at 9.45am: Curtice, Helen Miller of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, Tony Travers of the London School of Economics, and Sanjay Raja of Deutsche Bank. The committee sees the Office for Budget Responsibility on Wednesday afternoon. Healey himself is booked for 11 November.

Andy Burnham has already said the first Budget was smaller than the one he wanted. He is in Antigua this morning, opening a dialogue on a slavery apology rather than sitting behind his Chancellor. The poll gives Healey a fairness story he can use at the despatch box. It does not give him a growth story. Fair and unchanged is a verdict a Chancellor can survive for a week. It is a harder thing to take into a spending review.