Rishi Sunak talking about “viable jobs” but the truth is that while covid-19 restrictions in place we can’t tell what’s viable.

Announcing support for wage support for those businesses with on-going demand is welcome but lots have already lost jobs or in workplaces that can’t reopen. There should have been targeted sectoral furlough until at least the end of the year

Good that business can defer debt repayments and tax, but that’s a lot of debt that will be hung over to 2021/22 which will depress investment. The chancellor will need a plan for this

There’s been great PR around Rishi Sunak, but the truth is that he’s been told repeatedly, inc from Labour that businesses and employers will need more. These delays and gaps in gov announcements hurt businesses and jobs.

Great point from @AnnelieseDodds about training and skills.
Rishi Sunak seems to be divorcing short term measures to longer term change - a Chancellor with foresight would use this time to create stepping stones for people to get into jobs when economy doing better

Anneliese Dodds did a great job highlighting the issues with an approach that reacts rather than plans ahead.We need a budget this year to ensure there are goals for the economy beyond COVID-19 -if we don’t know what the vision is for the economy how can we design current policy?

Rishi Sunak didn’t even call the relevant people in the devolved nations to tell them the budget was cancelled. That is poor, and says a lot about how much this government thinks about and respects those running other parts of the nation