The UK Budget has been running for almost 300 years. It is a national institution with a rich history and its own customs and traditions - here are a few of the most interesting.
1) The word "budget" derives from the term "bougette" - a wallet in which either documents or money could be kept. 2) A chancellor delivering his Budget is the only MP allowed to take alcohol in the chamber. 3) When Norman Lamont was chancellor in the early 1990s, his Budget bag contained a bottle of whisky. The speech itself was carried in a plastic bag by his then aide, William Hague. "It would have been a major disaster if the bag had fallen open,'' Hague said later. 4) And Lamont wasn't the only chancellor to enjoy a spot of Dutch courage: Winston Churchill was a brandy man, Hu...
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