If Hugh Dalton, Chancellor of the Exchequer in 1947, had been alive to read the press in the last week he would surely have done so in disbelief. Dalton had to resign for giving some fairly innocuous budget tax details to a journalist while on his way to Parliament. This was before he had given his speech and the details turned up in the late afternoon edition while the markets were still open.

George Osborne’s ‘budget for growth’ has been all over the media for days as selected tidbits have been offered to grateful journalists. The greatest test for journalists following the speech itself was to find out which announcement had not been written up.

Osborne and the Treasury have shown themselves to be quite acute in getting broad themes from the budget into the pubic domain and setting the scene. The BFG (that’s the budget for growth, not the Big Friendly Giant)) has been firmly planted in the public mind, subsequently anchored by various businessmen and women and organisations.

Sir Martin Sorrell (surely soon to become Lord Sorrell of Adland), duly piped up with WPP’s coming home message to help the general business friendly theme. Presumably making dreams also counts as part of Britain’s hoped for manufacturing resurgence.

In communications terms this ‘brief early, brief often’ approach makes eminently good sense. There are so many components to a budget that the public simply cannot take them on board if they come in some statistical avalanche. And why waste any opportunity to get whatever crumbs of comfort there might be as we fight our way through the dire financial mess Labour left us?

There are also some other compelling lessons from the way the budget was presented. As Everett Dirksen said (or maybe he didn’t – there’s a lot of is dispute about this) ‘A billion here, a billion there and pretty soon you’re talking real money”. We simply can’t cope with numbers like this, they are too big to comprehend. When there’s an annual debt interest payment of £50 billion a year we know it’s a lot, but what does it actually mean? It gets a bit easier when you say ‘it’s about one billion a week’ and then better still if it is ‘ about £180 million a day’. Or what about ‘ we could build five new schools a week with that’.

And that is part of the answer about why the chancellor and media give prominence to 1 penny off petrol. At least we know what he’s talking about even if it is completely irrelevant in terms of just about every motorist. Actually we are making the huge saving of about 50p for every tank of petrol. That’s a KitKat cut.

Presumably the government is hoping that there are more people in Britain with a sweet tooth than ale lovers, who will be choking on a whopping 10p a pint rise. They seem to have called it right as the drinks industry has been drowned out by the comment on other aspects of the budget.

In appalling financial circumstances the Treasury team seems to have pulled off a good result in communications terms.

The aim has been to pull back from unremitting gloom (we’re in a hole and Labour dug it) to give a glimmer of hope, but with a ‘it’s still very tough message’.

George Osborne won’t be considering his position in the light of pre-budget ‘leaks’ and nor should he. The communications world have moved on light years since Dalton’s time. The only pity is that Labour Chancellor’s didn’t consider their positions in different circumstances.

Sadly no one pointed out to them the resignation of Peter Thorneycroft in 1958 – he and two colleagues left government in opposition to increased government expenditure. It is a tragedy for the country that Labour chancellors can’t just say no.

If Hugh Dalton, Chancellor of the Exchequer in 1947, had been alive to read the press in the last week he would surely have done so in disbelief. Dalton had to resign for giving some fairly innocuous budget tax details to a journalist while on his way to Parliament. This was before he had given his speech and the details turned up in the late afternoon edition while the markets were still open.

George Osborne’s ‘budget for growth’ has been all over the media for days as selected tidbits have been offered to grateful journalists. The greatest test for journalists following the speech itself was to find out which announcement had not been written up.

Osborne and the Treasury have shown themselves to be quite acute in getting over broad themes from the budget into the pubic domain and setting the scene. The BFG (that the budget for growth, not the Big Friendly Giant)) has been firmly planted in the public mind, subsequently anchored by various businessmen and women and organisations.

Sir Martin Sorrell (surely soon to become Lord Sorrell of Adland), duly piped up with WPP’s coming home message to help the general business friendly theme. Presumably making dreams also counts as part of Britain’s hoped for manufacturing resurgence.

In communications terms this ‘brief early, brief often’ approach makes eminently good sense. There are so many components to a budget that the public simply cannot take them on board if they come in some statistical avalanche. And why waste any opportunity to get whatever crumbs of comfort there might be as we fight our way through the dire financial mess Labour left us?

There are also some other compelling lessons from the way the budget was presented. As Everett Dirksen said (or maybe he didn’t – there’s a lot of is dispute about this) ‘A billion here, a billion there and pretty soon you’re talking real money”. We simply can’t cope with numbers like this, they are too big to comprehend. When there’s an annual debt interest payment of £50 billion a year we know it’s a lot, but what does it actually mean? It gets a bit easier when you say ‘it’s about one billion a week’ and then better still if it is ‘ about £180 million a day’. Or what about ‘ we could build five new schools a week with that’.

And that is part of the answer about why the chancellor and media give prominence to 1 penny off petrol. At least we know what he’s talking about even if it is completely irrelevant in terms of just about every motorist. Actually we are making the huge saving of about 50p for every tank of petrol. That’s a KitKat cut.

Presumably the government is hoping that there are more people in Britain with a sweet tooth than ale lovers, who will be choking on a whopping 10p a pint rise. They seem to have called it right as the drinks industry has been drowned out by the comment on other aspects of the budget.

In appalling financial circumstances the Treasury team seems to have pulled off a good result in communications terms.

The aim has been to pull back from unremitting gloom (we’re in a hole and Labour dug it) to give a glimmer of hope, but with a ‘it’s still very tough message’.

George Osborne won’t be considering his position in the light of pre-budget ‘leaks’ and nor should he. The communications world have moved on light years since Dalton’s time. The only pity is that Labour Chancellor’s didn’t consider their positions in different circumstances.

Sadly no one pointed out to them the resignation of Peter Thorneycroft in 1958 – he and two colleagues left government in opposition to increased government expenditure. It is a tragedy for the country that Labour chancellors can’t just say no.