taxed more like still wines. you must have been cock a hoop when you heard that, because that s a great dividing line, because that s posh people being helped by the government at a time when other people are feeling the squeeze. well, red wine is my favourite drink, i m not sure what s happening to that. i think if you re a port drinker, it s bad news for you. but if you re a champagne drinker, it is good news. although champagne is already quite expensive in the first place. so whether that will have a material impact on the cost of living crisis that people are experiencing at the moment, i m not entirely sure. you talk about the cost of living crisis and that s become the big theme in the days after the budget. so the government is putting what, more than £2 billion into universal credit, changing that thing called the taper rate, which is the rate at which universal credit is withdrawn and as you earn more from work. is that not a good way of helping people? helping them through
you ve also got a speech that you ve written in advance and some of it is going to reflect what the chancellor s said and some of it will be redundant, because he hasn t said it, or he has said it and you thought he was going to. so you ve got to think on your feet. and be ready to change your speech, based on what the chancellor has to say. that s what makes it difficult. but i mean lucky for us the chancellor had leaked most of it in the days preceding it. but there was still quite a lot of new material that you had so sort of galvanise and use. the reference to the champagne is to the big shake up of how booze is taxed, that will see sparkling wines in general, notjust champagne, taxed more like still wines. you must have been cock a hoop when you heard that, because that s a great dividing line, because that s posh people being helped by the government at a time when other people are feeling the squeeze. well, red wine is my favourite drink, i m not sure what s happening to that.