RACHEL REEVES ducked difficult decisions today but calmed Labour MPs in a Budget aimed above all at appeasing the City.

The statement, the first ever to be presented by a female chancellor, relied heavily on manipulating debt rules but appeared enough to stabilise a government enduring a catastrophic fall in public approval.

She won the loudest back-bench cheers for a commitment to put over £22 billion into the NHS for day-to-day spending, with more for rebuilding hospitals on top.

There was also good news for schools, which get more than £6bn in fresh funds, for housing and for HS2 passengers who do not wish to disembark in a west London industrial estate, since the line is now to be extended to Euston station.

Money markets initially took this and other new spending in their stride, although there were later indications of some bond market turbulence. 

They had been softened up by a comprehensive programme of pre-Budget leaks, which left the Commons Speaker enraged and Ms Reeves with little to surprise the Commons with.

Employers’ National Insurance is to do most of the heavy lifting in terms of funding the new spending and closing the near-mythical “black hole” that Labour has detected in the public finances, but whose dimensions the talismanic Office for Budget Responsibility refused to confirm in a statement. 

Capital gains tax and taxes on private equity are also to rise.

Ms Reeves, no flash rhetorician but aware she may have overdone the gloom of late, set out her agenda at the start of her lengthy address, telling MPs: “The prize on offer today is immense.

“More pounds in people’s pockets. An NHS that is there when you need it. An economy that is growing, creating wealth and opportunity for all. Because that is the only way to improve living standards.

“And the only way to drive economic growth is to invest, invest, invest. There are no short cuts. To deliver that investment, we must restore economic stability.”

She took every opportunity to hammer the Tory legacy, contrasting her measures with the last government’s performance, to repeated pantomime shouts of “shame” from Labour MPs directed towards Rishi Sunak, putting in his last parliamentary appearance as Tory leader.

Mr Sunak fought back by accusing Labour of breaking election promises not to increase the tax burden.

Ms Reeves repeated her claim that the Budget represented an “end to austerity,” and there appeared to be enough in the package to sustain the claim — until one delves into the details.

There was no reversal of the cruel commitment to keep the two-child benefit cap, nor of the decision to axe winter fuel payments for 10 million pensioners.

Simon Francis of the End Fuel Poverty Coalition said the Budget came up short in many areas. “What we needed to see in the short term was a restoration of winter fuel payments, an expansion of warm home discounts and reforms to improve and extend cold weather payments,” he said.

And Joseph Howes, End Child Poverty Coalition chairman, said:  “The government could have chosen to scrap the two-child limit to benefit payments, a policy which drives families into poverty.

“This opportunity has been missed.”

Ms Reeves also announced yet another crackdown on welfare and raised the bus fare cap from £2 to £3 for a single journey from the end of the year.

Jeremy Corbyn and the other independent alliance MPs, as well as Green MPs, issued a statement condemning the Budget.

They said: “Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves promised to deliver real change to the electorate after 14 years of Tory rule. Today, they have broken that promise. This Budget is austerity by another name.

“While we welcome the government’s decision to invest in schools and hospital buildings, it is extremely disappointing that these investments have been undermined by cruel attacks on the worst-off and a dogmatic refusal to redistribute wealth and power.

“These are not ‘tough choices’ for government ministers but for ordinary people who are forced to choose between heating their home and putting food on the table,” they said in a statement also backed by local councillors and others from across the country.

And Communist Party general secretary Robert Griffiths commented: "Labour’s plans to spend more on the NHS, schools and housing are welcome — but they fall far short of what a real government for workers and their families could and should do.”