Like all budgets there are a number of individual policy announcements, but the big picture was the Chancellor being forced to downgrade the country’s economic growth forecasts this year and every year for the next few years.

This is the biggest downgrade in growth forecasts since the financial crisis. It means that we are projected to have a smaller economy and be less well off as a country than was expected a couple of years ago. There has already been a post referendum squeeze on living standards as the weaker pound forces up the price of goods and incomes are now not expected to even get back to pre-crash levels until 2023.