Opinion: Suffolk voters now see a real Labour budget

Whether it succeeds will take years to judge - but Rachel Reeves will be hoping some of the benefits she hopes for will start to emerge in the next two or three years and will be clear by the time of the next election in 2029.

Opposition politicians will be looking for early signs that her ambition is failing - but the Conservatives know their brand is tarnished after the failures of the last five years and it will take a long time to re-establish their credibility among those who are not already true-blue believers.

What makes this a refreshing budget is the fact it has broken with the mantra that has developed over recent decades - including during much of Gordon Brown's chancellorship - that low taxes are good and government spending is bad.

I had planned to write a defence of increasing taxes to pay for improved government services today - but frankly I couldn't do any better than my fellow columnist Mark Murphy did last Saturday so I would urge everyone to read his piece again.

What I will say is that this budget does appear to be starting to address this issue - although like the vast majority of politicians from all parties Ms Reeves is a bit of a coward when it comes to taxes.

If we really want a fair taxation system, which is what most politicians claim, then the fairest way of raising that tax is by a tax on income. Putting up income tax for those who earn more.

I don't mean just for the super-rich - they should certainly pay more but the overall tax that would raise is pretty low - I mean also for those who are in relatively well-paid jobs.

It would be wrong for a chancellor to follow Denis Healey's example and "squeeze the rich until the pips squeak" but I don't see why there shouldn't be a 50% or even a 55% tax rate for those on six-figure salaries.

That seems a lot fairer than all the dancing on a pinhead we've had over the definition of a "working person" over the last few weeks which defines the Prime Minister as worker - but thinks Mrs Smith who runs an independent coffee shop with a couple of part-time baristas as a business leader living on her investment and is rip for massive tax and wage cost hikes!

In the end there was support for very small businesses with fewer than four employees - which I'm sure many will welcome. It's just a pity so many ministers spent so much time putting fear into the self-employed sector before getting to the facts!

But however the tax is raised, this budget clearly signals that the government sees the need to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure and services that have been allowed to decay over the last 15 years.

We all know things are bad. Schools have been closed because their ceilings could collapse. Hospitals have roofs held up by pit-props. Villains are being released early because previous governments didn't build enough prisons. Potholes blight our roads. I could go on.

There does now appear to be a chancellor in place who recognises that the be-all and end-all of a budget should not be cutting taxes and that has to be a relief.

Hopefully she will eventually get the courage to really look at the fairness of the tax system and not be intimidated by the editors of the Mail, Express and Torygraph into this strange belief that keeping taxes low for the wealthy is more important than looking after the welfare of the poor!

Will the budget succeed? Who knows. Politics is as much about changing public sentiment and inspiring confidence as it is in putting together the nuts and bolts of an economic system.

The model we have been operating under for years has failed. It has left us with terribly damaged public services and a population that has lost faith in the ability of politicians to improve things.

Let's hope that the budget is the start of a change in direction - only time will tell.

The opinions expressed in this column are the personal views of Paul Geater and do not necessarily reflect views held by this newspaper, its sister publications or its owner and publisher Newsquest Media Group Ltd.