KEVIN MAGUIRE: 'Rachel Reeves transformed herself from Scrooge to Mother Christmas'

'Budget deserves to be remembered as the moment the UK Labour Government found its moral purpose and consigned the callous, cruel and cynical Tory two-child benefit to the dustbin of British history'

In one short Budget intervention, thundered Labour lay preacher Gordon Brown, Rachel Reeves did more to transform the lives of 450,000 of Britain’s poorest children than any of seven Conservative predecessors who, over 14 grim years, did nothing but harm to the lives of vulnerable kids.

Boosting at a stroke so many young lives was the glittering jewel in an otherwise largely tough Budget from Reeves, a Chancellor of the Exchequer who finally played a bad hand decently. The £150 household fuel bill cut, higher minimum wage, rail fares and, in England where the sick still pay for medicines, pr