The retiree: ‘Investing in the NHS, that’s only a good thing’

Richard Cox, 72, was one of millions of pensioners who lost out on the winter fuel allowance when the government announced changes to the payments in July.

But he and his wife can afford to miss out. “We are fortunate enough to be financially stable, and therefore the reduction in the allowance is OK with us,” he said.

Cox has a state and private pension from the UK and from his time working abroad in France, as well as a “very small pension” from Ireland. He and his wife own their home in Derby. He does not get the full state pension due to his time living abroad, but receives £786.04 a month. This will go up by 4.1% under the “triple lock”.

He is happy the government has committed to investing in public services. “We have a problem in this country with declining services,” he said. “Schools crumbling, prisons desperately need investment. So there needs to be major investment in infrastructure. Investing in infrastructure in the NHS, that’s only a good thing. Going digital with the health service too.”

The young worker: ‘I’m not sure 1p off a pint is going to cut it’

Issy Horn, 28, says she has to be extra cautious when the end of the month rolls around. “There’s this saying that you’ll walk five seconds down the street in London and you’ve already spent £40,” she said.

And the cut to duty on draught beer of 1.7% – about 1p a pint – won’t help much. “I’m not sure 1p is going to cut it.” She added: “As long as the price of everything else stays pretty stable it will be fine, but I still think it might offend some people.”

But the vaping tax is “fantastic”. “My younger sister is 15 and [I] wouldn’t want to ever see her smoking or vaping.”

Horn, who works in fashion communications, said “rent is just so expensive” and takes up a good chunk of her income. She also makes a “pittance” through creating content for TikTok. Her London rent and bills come to about £1,000.

A bugbear on every payslip is national insurance. “I just want to be a bit more clear on where that [money is] going, because right now I don’t really know.”

Horn said the promised investment in the NHS Reeves announced in the budget is great. “My mum works for the NHS, so I know that they’re really struggling.

The family: ‘We need the car to be able to go to work’

Chris Matthewman, 38, had an overwhelming sense of relief after finding out his fuel costs would not shoot up. After being made redundant in July and without work for a few months, he has gone back to his previous job as a fleet manager, taking a 10% pay cut.

He and his wife Tracey, a school teacher, live in Basildon, Essex, and rent. They burned through their savings to pay for living costs while he was job hunting. He got jobseeker’s allowance but was not entitled to universal credit.

“My council tax five years ago was £146 a month. It is now £225,” he said. “I used to do a month’s shopping for £400. Now it’s close to £800.”

Rent is almost 30% of the couple’s budget. With other expenses, it takes them to 80%. “And that’s not including your fuel stuff.” Their car is one of their biggest outgoings. With insurance, repayments and petrol, it comes to £750 a month, he said. To fill their Citroën, they spend between £65 and £80 on petrol which lasts about 10 days.

Matthewman drives to and from work every day and has cut down on the “little luxuries and trips” to save money. “We need the car to be able to go to work,” he said. “We need it to be able to go shopping. We need a car to do everything in our life.

“Our main takeaway from the whole budget was just relief that we’re not worse off than we were yesterday, but at the same time disappointed that we’re not better off.”

The single parent: ‘Fighting poverty is deferred’

Jonny Roberts, a single father with two children, had been keen to hear what the government planned to do to “make life better for people on universal credit”.

The 37-year-old, who lives in Newbury, Berkshire, said the focus before the budget was on taxing people who are well-off rather than “what they are going to do to help people who aren’t”.

After listening to Reeves, he said: “While there were a few small fixes to universal credit for those in debt, and a welcome expansion of access to the help-to-save scheme, there wasn’t really anything to help the majority on UC. It feels like a budget where fighting poverty is deferred.”

Roberts, a film and media studies teacher at a secondary school, has a nine-year-old daughter and a six-year-old son. He pays £1,200 a month to rent a two-bed apartment. But the local housing allowance, which sets the maximum people renting from a private landlord can claim in housing benefit or universal credit, in his area is £875.

The national minimum wage will go up to £12.21 an hour in April after the chancellor confirmed a 6.7% increase – a move said to be worth £1,400 a year for an eligible full-time worker.

But Roberts said: “Talk of the minimum wage rise being worth £1,400 if you work full time [35 hours is the assumption it’s based on] isn’t true for those on UC. They’ll lose 28% in income tax and NI contributions, then the remaining amount will see their UC tapered away.” As a result, he says, they are better off by about £453. “Don’t get me wrong, that’s £453 in the pockets of some of the poorest, but it’s considerably less impressive than the £1,400 gross figure.”

The pension saver: ‘It’s made all my worries irrelevant’

Sean, 61, had been concerned about possible changes to pensions and capital gains tax that could mean the difference between “a reasonably comfortable and secure” old age and an “impoverished” one. But his worries never materialised. “It’s kind of made all my worries irrelevant,” he said.

Sean (who did not wish to give his surname) lives in Dorset and works full-time in the manufacturing sector. “I’m earning well at the moment but have been poor for much of my life,” he said. He has little in the way of a pension and does not own a property – his partner owns the house they live in.

“I’m looking at mitigating my position by increasing payments into my company pension,” he says. “I vary from thinking I want to retire tomorrow to thinking I’m going to have to work until I’m 90.”

He has “a hobby interest” in classic cars. “I’ve accumulated assets which are (by sheer chance) worth quite a lot now.” This could help finance his retirement, but changes to capital gains tax (CGT) could have affected him.

Then there’s inheritance tax (IHT). Speaking before the budget, Sean was worried about mooted changes, such as abolition of the residence nil rate band.

However, the changes he worried about did not feature, though the headline rates of CGT have increased with immediate effect.

Overall, he thought “it was a good performance” from Rachel Reeves, and that her budget “seemed to have a political vision behind it”.