Am I the only one that thinks that the budget is good?!

We are one of the richest countries in the world, we should not be forced into sharing properties just so that our pensioners can eat and heat.

That’s not what the putting money into pensions was.

I agree OP. I mean it could be better but not bad at all.

This does apply to a fair percentage.

I see the removal of the child benefit cap as a negative. Whilst it will help poor families, it will also pay out to rich families too. I would actually rather see child benefit scrapped completely and the money saved going directly to just families that need it. That's probably my biggest issue with it, it's a really odd decision that smacks of tring to win a popularity competition, not doing the best for our country. That said, I do like the mansion tax and the ISA and pension changes that stop the wealthy avoiding tax.

It doesn’t poll well at all.

But surely you can both live together so she has warmth and you could suggest it as her helping you rather than you helping her.

For those saying that the removal of the two-child cap will lead to people having more children, the LSE has researched the effect on choices to have children around the cap, and found it had a relatively small impact in disincentivising people from having more than two children.

‘Poverty’ is a statistical value. If your household income is more than 60% of the median income after housing then you officially no longer in poverty. Yay! But this doesn’t mean kids lives are any better. It’s just handing parents cash for them to spend on whatever they like. Fags, booze, horse racing.

Yes millions of people on working age benefits and millions of immigrants coming in to do those unskilled jobs means I know. It’s not rocket science. Even a child could figure it out.

I understand where you're coming from and definitely people do make poor life choices but if you're still in your twenties then there's loads of time for you to maybe end up a single parent, or out of work or struck down with an illness or injured in an accident and unable to work. So you are being a bit smug.

We definitely need balance and incentives to work. We are have a good income but not naive enough to think that being on benefits could never happen to me

Don't really bother me, I earn enough that I can afford to pay more.

Can’t wait to see Labour being punished at polls by people paying for this largesse for other people to have multiple kids for free, while they themselves to have cut back on affording things for their own kids.

I feel ok about it. Relieved actually as I thought it would be a lot worse.

There are work arounds to the ISA change so I dont see why that is a big issue.

I’m impacted by the pension change but as it’s just NI and not additional income tax on it, the amount I will pay extra is quite low and nowhere near enough to make the salary sacrifice not worthwhile. However, I am concerned about my employer making changes based on what their increase will be so will need to see how that plays out.

The additional council tax thresholds were fair in my opinion although I appreciate that there will always be edge cases for the £2m threshold in the SE that it causes an issue for.

Tax on EVs was also fair imo.

The freeze in thresholds for me was preferable for me that an increase in income tax and fairer across the board.

More needs to be done though about the number of people on benefits. It should be a short term safety net not a way of life. I don’t think more money should be given directly to parents of children in poverty- I would rather see it in the form of food/clothes vouchers etc so it’s more likely to actually benefit the children.

You know they're pretending, do you?

I don’t think that’s true anymore.

I dont

I’m not aware of any money being allocated to schools or NHS?

It’s another £30bn tax hike after pledging not to. Markets don’t care about taxes but not everyone will think that’s great.

I will be a little bit worse off but I’m not struggling. So if it helps lift children out of poverty (it will) and it means money is available for schools and the NHS, then I’m happy to pay. I DO care about the bigger picture

who’s people? I’m in my twenties still with three kids yeah I had ny first at 16 and had to go on benefits but I waited till I’d sorted myself out financially before having my younger two. That’s the REASON I don’t get these grown woman who have loads of kids while still on benefits. Two child cap was reasonable but having over two while still expecting people to pay for them all is taking the piss

I was dreading it but it could have been so much worse.

Many of these posters think it will never happen to them…

That's so sad about your friend. I’ve struggled as a Lone parent for many years and it’s very, very hard.

It’s not great. It's all buy now pay later...

Apparently, higher taxes to support an ever growing number of unproductive people is now the master plan for economic growth. Bring in a Nordic style system and weed out the chancers and slackers.

There is no real focus on actually growing the economy. Presumably that's on hold until 2028 like many of their other policies?

Child poverty will still exist. Because when all is said and done parents are the main reason that children in poverty will remain so.