Torridge and West Devon MP Geoffrey Cox has welcomed the chancellor’s Budget, calling it ’a Budget to make Britain fit for the future’.

The Budget on March 16 was dominated by the news that the UK economy is likely to grow more slowly in the next five years than had been expected last November. Under the Office for Budget Responsibility’s new forecast, the estimate for economic growth in 2017 has been cut from 2.5% to 2.2% and to 2.1% from 2.4% in 2017. Growth in both 2019 and 2020 is now estimated at 2.1% rather than the previous forecast of 2.3%.

Chancellor George Osborne used the Budget to unveil a tax on sugary drinks and make other key announcements, including a 2% increase in tax on cigarettes and 3% on rolling tobacco, a freeze in beer and cider duty and the levy on whisky and other spirits, raising the tax-free personal allowance to £11,500, and the ISA limit being raised to £20,000 a year. The Government is also introducting of the Lifetime ISA, which will give savers under 40 a 25% bonus capped at up to £4,000 each year.

Mr Osborne also used his Budget speech to say all schools in England will become academies; all schools must become academies by 2020 or have official plans to do so by 2022.

Mr Cox said the Budget puts ’the next generation first’ by raising the tax-free personal allowance, freezing fuel duty to help household and businesses budgets, introducing the Lifetime ISA, cutting taxes for small businesses, and improving schools through the chancellor’s academies plan.

Mr Cox said: ’Britain’s economy is strong, growing and resilient because of the steps we have taken over the past six years and because we are not weighed down by membership of the Eurozone but are free to set our own interest rates and chart our own fiscal course. It shows what can be done when we are free to design policies to suit the needs of our own country.

’However, we must continue to manage our economy responsibly with a steady determination to get the public finances under control and put our nation’s prosperity on a permanently virtuous spiral of development.

’That is why this Conservative Government is taking all of the steps we currently can to ensure that Britain is fit for the future. That means ensuring we have sound public finances at the same time as improving schools, helping savers, cutting taxes for both hardworking people and businesses, and giving the green light to major infrastructure projects.

’This Budget chooses to put forward long term solutions to long term problems. It puts the next generation first and redoubles our efforts to make Britain and Torridge and West Devon able to confront with confidence whatever the future will bring.’

What did you think of the Budget? Is it good news for the area or are the economic predictions too gloomy? Share your thoughts with us in the comments section or email [email protected]