This was a budget of bounding hubris by a chancellor who feels he has the next general election in the bag, the next leadership election within reach and a new fluffy kitten strategy to deploy.

That is the one where you put something sweet and cuddly on the table to stop people from asking who killed all the dead cats lying around the room.

So we had a sugar tax on soft drinks, a lifetime Isa for young people, more money for school sports and flood defences, and a glossing-over of the terrible economic figures which show he has failed to meet his own targets, a spin put on the scandalous cuts in disability benefits, and the ending of locally accountable state education.

Jeremy Corbyn did a good, straight job in exposing the figures, saying this was a budget with ‘unfairness at its core’ and highlighting the continuing intergenerational injustices hitting young people who cannot get jobs to match their skills, or get homes to match their low incomes.

He pointed to the struggle the chancellor – or he could by then be the prime minister – will have in getting the budget into surplus, and the continued failure to reduce the debt-to-GDP ratio.

The detailed Treasury Red Book figures also show a hidden sting in the tail. In the run-up to the 2020 election there is a sharp swing from a deficit of £21.4bn to a surplus of £10.4bn, so there will be some big cuts, or sell-offs just before the election.

George Osborne ducked some of the big challenges facing the economy. Despite all the speculation, there was nothing on pension reform, no increase in fuel duty or most of the ‘sin’ taxes, with the big exception of sugar. There is no strategy for increasing productivity, for reviving manufacturing industry or stimulating the flagging level of earnings that leave people working hard, without any commensurate improvement in their living standards. His apparent big giveaways to the business community were all virtually self-financing.

But this was a budget about making the Tory party feel good about itself and its putative new leader. So Osborne set out his stall as a leader who would both shrink the state and occupy the centre-ground of politics by making some concessions to poor people: Margaret Thatcher and Geoffrey Howe rolled into one.

Forcing all schools to become academies will effectively end 100 years of state education being democratically accountable to local education authorities. The fresh round of spending cuts, as yet unspecified, will decimate the criminal justice system and local government.

Tackling rough sleeping will show goodwill towards people made homeless largely as a result of government policy.

Providing a lifetime Isa will help higher-income parents provide a nest egg for their children, but will do little for those on low earnings: latest figures show that 800,000 people are on zero-hours contracts, an increase of 15 per cent in the last year.

Providing a ‘help to save’ scheme will do nothing. Treasury figures show that this much-vaunted scheme will cost the government only £20,000 over the lifetime of this entire parliament.

Sitting at Osborne’s right hand, David Cameron turned pink with delight at his chancellor’s jibes at Corbyn; his eyes glazed over at the technical details of the new Isas. Sitting on Osborne’s left, Theresa May looked sour: this could be the budget that seals all their leadership fates.

———————————

Sally Keeble is a former minister and former member of the Treasury select committee. She tweets @Sally_Keeble