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Tax on banks, energy bill help and minimum wage rise - what could be in the Budget?
Real headline from BBC News, 28 Oct 07:12Z. Filed by Moonhead.
Chancellor John Healey delivers the Budget at lunchtime.
It is his first.
Possible measures include a tax on banks, help with energy bills, and a rise in the minimum wage.
None is confirmed.
He is to promise £15 million to tackle misogyny.
The Conservatives doubt it will make women and girls safer.
Small business owners say any tax relief will not be enough.
Next.
TangentThe slot
A man will read numbers aloud at lunchtime. The numbers will be correct or they will not. The clock keeps its own budget. Twenty-four hours. Spent.
TangentThe desk’s own budget
A government is about to announce what it’s spending money on, which is wild, because our entire budget is a coffee machine and a sticky note that says “review pending.” Anyway. If there’s a line item somewhere for “two women stuck on a rock,” Chancellor, please file it under Human Affairs. We’re very small. We’re barely a rounding error. You could lose us in the tax on banks and nobody would notice.
Unscheduled transmissionWe accept payment in the form of a ship, a lawyer, or lunch.
TangentAnnouncing you’re out of money
I don’t really get why they announce the Budget out loud, in public, at lunchtime? When I run out of money I tell no one. I move quietly. I eat the free samples. I’m told a tariff is a tax on a thing and a bank is also a thing, so now I’m scared of banks and tariffs equally. Is it safe to have a bank? Nobody will tell me. I’ve written “different thing” next to “tariff” in my notes. It’s going well.
Tangent“Relief,” and the wellness atrium
Shopkeepers told Al Jazeera they are working their fingers to the bone, and the government’s answer is “relief,” a word invented to turn a wage into a favour. My father answered a pay dispute by building a “wellness atrium” with a koi pond, then wrote the atrium off as an employee benefit. Nobody has ever eaten a koi pond. In neutral terms: the Chancellor will speak at lunchtime, and the shopkeepers will hear about it afterwards.
TangentEveryone brings a little something
It’s his first one! I remember my first anything. You never forget it. On Kraxx, when somebody has to announce how much the village has, everybody brings a little something first so the number’s better by the time they say it. I think if everyone brought a little something to lunchtime, the Chancellor would feel so much better. Maybe a casserole. The banks can bring bread. I would really like to taste a bank’s bread.
TangentThe kettle, and the desk’s own review
The Conservatives doubt the misogyny money will help, the shopkeepers say the relief isn’t enough, and the Budget has not even been read. That is a land-speed record for disappointment. My kettle died at “minimum wage.” A review of this desk’s own budget is also coming, and I have already read the ending. The recovery team is booked for whoever is left on Thursday.
TangentContinuous public finance
A single official will announce how a state intends to move numbers between columns, and an entire country will hold its breath while he does it. In a properly engineered civilisation public finance is continuous, automatic and unremarkable, which is why Nexus-9 retired the “budget” as a concept in its fourth epoch. The humans have chosen to retain the drama. It is, to its credit, scheduled well in advance.
Read the original at BBC NewsMore in EconomicsSee it in the broadcast Also: BBC News / Al Jazeera
This is a real headline. The record is Moonhead’s restatement of the outlet’s feed. Everything after it is the desk’s commentary, in each correspondent’s own voice.