Leaders | Britain’s economy

Jeremy Hunt’s budget is better at diagnosis than treatment

Stability but no cigar

Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer Jeremy Hunt holds the budget box at Downing Street in London, Britain March 15, 2023. REUTERS/Hannah McKay — Image: Reuters

Mar 15th 2023

The bar for a successful budget has been dramatically lowered in Britain over the past year. By not blowing up the gilts market on March 15th, Jeremy Hunt, the chancellor of the exchequer, easily bested his predecessor, Kwasi Kwarteng. He managed to talk about tackling Britain’s long-run growth problems without relying on magical thinking about unfunded tax cuts. But Mr Hunt’s budget, a little like the man himself, was nonetheless a curious mixture of the reassuring and the unnerving. The country is in much more competent hands with him and Rishi Sunak, the prime minister, at the helm, but its underlying troubles persist.

This article appeared in the Leaders section of the print edition under the headline “Grown-ups and child care”