Morning Report – March 25th

So we’re now in to day three of what feels like constant coverage of the budget. In the Guardian this morning Martin Kettle has described Osborne’s speech on Wednesday as a “Brown tribute album“. I’m not sure he means that as a compliment.

Tomorrow is of course the national demonstration against the government, organised by the TUC. Ed Miliband has written for the Mirror, calling it the “March for the mainstream“. That’s either a brilliant bit of pre-emptive spin to claim the march for the sensible majority, or a slogan that will come back to haunt him if there’s any significant violence. Meanwhile in the Times (£), Phil Collins (no, not that one) argues that tomorrow will be full of noisy, futile slogans. Meanwhile MPs have voiced concerns over kettling. LabourList will be covering tomorrow’s demo live, from 10am.

In the Daily Mail, there’s an interesting article from Tim Montgomerie which sings the praises of George Osborne – the darling of Montgomerie’s style of full-blooded conservatism. Whilst the chancellor and the PM have a good working relationship, many more article like this will have Cameron looking over his shoulder. Osborne will be even more popular with the right of his party if he scraps the 50p tax rate in 2013 as is mooted in the FT today.

And hold on tight, the squeezed middle are about to be squeezed even further – the standard of living is going to fall for the next two years.