Budget 2017 live - key points: Tories pivot to public spending in bid to keep out Corbyn
Follow all the latest updates as Chancellor presents his 2017 Budget
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Your support makes all the difference.Welcome to The Independent’s liveblog with coverage of the response to Philip Hammond’s Budget.
The Chancellor was forced to admit that growth and productivity forecasts had been downgraded, with the Official for Budget Responsibility (OBR) predicting lower growth than at any time in its history.
It comes after the UK’s finances unexpectedly worsened last month after the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said public sector net borrowing – stripping out state-owned banks – jumped by £500m to £8bn in October.
Despite this, Mr Hammond used the Budget to announce a splurge of new investment, including £3bn set aside for preparing for Brexit, an immediate £350m cash boost for the NHS, a £2.5bn investment fund and £500m support for the tech industry. This can partly be seen as a response to Labour's shock performance at the polls earlier this year, which has forced the Tories to do more to address rising anger at inequality, and try to quell support for Jeremy Corbyn.
Follow the 2017 Budget as it happened below
A series of small giveaways had earlier been trailed by the Treasury, including extending discount railcards to 25-30 year-olds from next Spring and tackling overpayments of student loans.
This was a Budget in which Mr Hammond could not afford any major slip-ups. Tory MPs were nervous of a repeat of the excruciating U-turn on a key announcement in the Budget in Spring, where the Chancellor was forced to pull the plug on his plan to raise taxes for the self-employees through increased national insurance contributions after considerable pressure from Conservative MPs.
If there is any repeat of this, Mr Hammond's position in Number 11 will be very precarious indeed.
More criticism of the Budget - this time from the Liberal Democrats, who claim the £2.3 billion fund for research and development will barely make up for the funding UK companies currently receive from the European Investment Fund.
Susan Kramer, the party's Treasury spokesperson, said:
“British firms are already finding their funding is drying up as Brexit looms, yet there is hardly a British tech company that hasn’t benefited from the European Investment Fund.
“It is no surprise that the pound plummeted during Philip Hammond's speech – if the Chancellor were on I’m a Celebrity, he would have been voted out of the Jungle.”
Everyone loves a chart and our Economics Editor, Ben Chu, has given you six of them. They're a mixed bag for the Government, with growth and productivity downgraded but debt also set to fall and deficit targets due to be met...
Philip Hammond's Budget was enough to secure his job and ensure his political survival, writes Political Commentator Andrew Grice
Hmm - I'm not sure digital minister Matt Hancock thought that one through...
An explosive revelation hidden in the small print of the OBR's Budget briefing. The watchdog says the UK's budget deficit will not be cleared until 2013 - 16 YEARS later than the Conservatives originally promised. More on that breaking story:
That concludes the Independent's autumn budget 2017 liveblog. Thanks for following. There'll be more budget news on www.independent.co.uk throughout the evening.
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