What we thought of the Budget...
"Not a lot really! I cannot believe that the Chancellor is actually encouraging "buy-to-let" schemes. Already more and more young people are being forced out of the property market and this can only make things worse. I'd be taxing owners of two or more homes to the hilt!!"

Wednesday 17th March - BUDGET DAY... Chancellor Gordon Brown unveiled his tax and spending plans for the next year in his Budget - read our summary below. If you would like to make a comment, then please leave your feedback here.

Main points:

• Mr Brown said pensioners over 70 to get an extra £100 to help them cope with council tax bills.



• The education budget for the UK will rise from £49bn this year to £64bn by 2007/08. The education budget for the UK will rise to £77bn by 2007/08, said Mr Brown.



• The amount of money spent on each pupil in England will rise from £2,500 in 1997, to £4,500 today to £5,500 by 2007/08, said Mr Brown.



• Every primary headteacher will receive a direct payment of over £55,000 and every secondary school head, £180,000, said Mr Brown.



• The capital investment budget for English education will rise to £8.1bn a year by 2008. By 2015 every secondary school can be refurbished or rebuilt with world class technology, said Mr Brown.



• Mr Brown said every teenager will have the offer of training or education until age 18. There will be up to 1,000 more specialist schools designated.



• Employer Training Pilots will be extended to the North East, Lancashire, the Black Country, Devon and Cornwall, Cambridgeshire and West Yorkshire, the chancellor said.



• Mr Brown announced a New Deal for Skills which will guarantee every adult an opportunity to gain Level 2 skills.



• Mr Brown said the government was announcing a 10-year framework for medical science. By 2008 the budget for medical research and research development within the NHS will approach £1.2bn each year.



• The spending review will provide for real terms growth in transport in the country, Mr Brown said, rejecting calls for spending on housing, local government and services to the elderly to be frozen.



• Mr Brown said he proposed real terms increases in defence spending.



• Mr Brown said investment was affordable, fully financed and linked to reform.



• Mr Brown said the NHS will receive a real terms rise of 7.2% each year until 2008.



• The Inland Revenue and Customs and Excise announcing a gross reduction of 14,000 staff, redeployment of 3,500 staff and an overall reduction by 2008 of 10,500 staff.



• The Department of Work and Pensions is announcing from today a reduction of 40,000 staff posts, a redeploymnet of 10,000 posts to new priorities and an overall reduction over four years of 30,000 posts, said Mr Brown. Staff numbers falling from 130,000 now to 100,000 by 2008.



• Mr Brown said he hoped all MPs agreed with the long term case for investment in education, science and enterprise. It was the duty of the whole nation to put short term considerations second.



• Mr Brown said the choice in this Budget was whether to cut tax rates or continue a programme of rising public investment in order to keep the country stable, secure and economically strong.



• Mr Brown said the government will not freeze or cut all international development aid.



• Mr Brown said until March 2006, churches and sacred places will be able to reclaim all 17.5% of VAT.



• Mr Brown said duty frozen on spirits, but the cost of a packet of cigarettes will rise by 8p.



• 1p on a pint of beer, 4p on a bottle of wine, duty frozen on cider and sparkling wine, said Mr Brown.



• British film makers to get 20% tax relief, said Mr Brown.



• Mr Brown said from 1 September fuel industry will be moving to sulphur fuel, so he will be delaying the annual rise in fuel duty for six months.



• Mr Brown said the government will relocate out of Whitehall a total of 20,000 public services jobs.



• From 1 April, firms with turnovers under £58,000 will not have to register for VAT and 13,000 businesses will be eligible to benefit from simplified VAT accounting.



• Mr Brown said he will exempt more estates from inheritance tax, raising the starting point for tax to £263,000.



• Mr Brown said he will freeze rates on the aggregates levy, betting duties and stamp duty.



• Mr Brown said he would freeze rates on tax and capital gains tax, air passenger duty, insurance premium tax, on vehicle excise duty and the climate change levy.



• Mr Brown said the priorities for this country were to entrench stability and ensure and enhance security.



• Unemployment is costing the UK £3bn a year less than in 1997, said Mr Brown.



• Mr Brown said the tax loophole for small company dividends would be closed.
• Mr Brown said debt was lower than Britain's competitors and that was why he was able to afford all the country's existing commitments in Iraq and Afghanistan.



• Mr Brown said net borrowing this year and in future years to 2008-9 is as a percentage of GDP 3.4%, 2.8%, 2.5%, 2.1%, 1.9% and 1.6% of GDP.



• Debt this year is 33% of national income and should be kept below 40% of national income, said Mr Brown.



• Mr Brown said he aimed to keep the debt to GDP ratio low and stable while balancing the current Budget, allowing Britain to borrow for investment. These rules have been tested and have succeeded at every stage of the last two economic cycles, he said.



• Mr Brown said it was right for Britain's unemployed to move from welfare to work and for the level of pensioner credit to rise.



• Mr Brown said it "must be in the interests of the whole country" for the environment to be safeguarded, there to be more affordable housing and low interest rates.



• On housing, Mr Brown said the government accepted the recommendations by economist Kate Barker in relation to the rented sector.



• Growth forecast for 2005 is 3-3.5% and 2.5-3% in 2006, said Mr Brown.



• Inflation is expected to be 1.75% this year and 2% next year and the year after, said Mr Brown.



• Mr Brown said imports and exports are expected to grow by more than 5%.



• The chancellor said: "Britain is closer to full employment today than for a generation."



• Mr Brown said that growth came together with low inflation, low interest rates and low unemployment.



• Mr Brown said Britain had met his forecast economic growth target of 2.3%.



• Mr Brown said to become a world economic leader, Britain must make the necessary investment in science, education and enterprise.



• Mr Brown said Britain's global reach was "wider than almost any other country".



• The chancellor said Britain was enjoying its longest period of sustained economic growth for 200 years.



• Mr Brown said since 1997 Britain has sustained growth through two economic cycles without suffering the "all British disease of stop go".



• Mr Brown said the purpose of his Budget statement was to lock in the economic stability "that can and will endure".

What the politicians had to say from the other parties...

• The international community was paying 80% of the costs, the British taxpayer was now having to pay every single penny, said Dr Cable.



• Dr Cable said one of the reasons why public expenditure had grown faster than expected was because of the Iraq war.



• Dr Cable said the Department for Trade and Industry and the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs were "grossly over-staffed".



• Dr Cable said the government had introduced "endless" gimmicks "which have complicated the tax system".



• Dr Cable said the government should be most ashamed of the fact that lower income brackets are paying a higher level of their income on tax, than those in higher income brackets.



• Dr Cable said: "I don't believe there is a fiscal crisis. There is a fiscal deficit problem that needs addressing."



• Vincent Cable, the Lib Dems economic affairs spokesman, rose to address the Commons at 1341 GMT, in place of the party's leader Charles Kennedy who is suffering a violent stomach bug.



• "This country will go into oblivion as the borrow now, tax later government and the sooner they go, the better it will be for our country," added Mr Howard before resuming his seat.



• Mr Howard said the nation will soon face the choice between the Tories wanting to give patients and parents more control, compared with the government, which will "never" offer real reform of public services.



• Mr Howard said average council tax has risen by 70% since 1997. "Despite all these taxes, the chancellor still has to borrow more and more," he said.



• "If Labour get a third term, tax rises are inevitable," said Mr Howard.



• Mr Howard said this was a government that had increased taxes and borrowing. The borrowing announced today was unsustainable, he said.



• Mr Howard said the government had achieved the lowest number of new build housing in peace time since 1924.



• Mr Howard welcomed the increased resources to combat terrorism and the savings from merging Customs and Excise with the Inland Revenue.



• Mr Howard said the budget was "borrow now, tax later".



• "The truth is this is a credit card budget from a credit card chancellor," said Mr Howard.



• Mr Howard said the central question in the Budget was if everything was going so well, "why does he have to borrow so much".



• Tory leader Michael Howard rose to speak at 1327 GMT.