JEFF PRESTRIDGE: Labor’s attack on pensions is not over yet. So I believe they will be attacked AGAIN in the near future.

The fallout from Wednesday’s budget continues, and it’s not good.

As much as I hate to say it, the country appears to be heading towards weakened buffers, in the grip of anemic economic growth, under the weight of a bloated and inefficient public sector, and a creaking business community currently under siege from a tsunami. new Labor taxes and costly regulations.

Maybe I’m being too pessimistic and I’ll be proven wrong (it won’t be the first time). But even the nation’s leading economic think tanks are now questioning the value of Rachel Reeves’ spending and borrowing splurge; Some of this is being paid for by a £40bn tax hit on businesses and households.

Rachel Reeves leaves 11 Downing Street with the red box before announcing her Budget on Wednesday

Post-Budget, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) warned that the country faced ‘a decade of higher taxes’, adding that ‘the state is growing and is unlikely to shrink again anytime soon’.

Chillingly, it has been said that the Chancellor will probably have to go back to households and businesses for more tax revenue.

For businesses already reeling from a £25bn National Insurance tax hit, this will mean lower profits, higher prices and a reduction in workforce. For working households, this will lead to lower wage increases (if their jobs still exist) and more taxes on their savings and investments. We are one step closer to financial dystopia.

Putting on my personal finance hat, my biggest concern after Wednesday’s serious Budget is that Ms Reeves is in danger of destroying the country’s savings culture.

Last Wednesday’s anti-austerity measures – a frightening inheritance tax (IHT) hit on pensions and an increase in capital gains tax on profits from investments – were bad enough in themselves. But given the IFS’s view that the Chancellor’s thirst for tax revenue is far from quenched, it is clear that our pensions (private, not public) will come under attack again in the near future.

Edward Hughes, 71, a retired shoemaker from Ware in Hertfordshire, speaks for many. He has been a saver all his life, but fears that the tendency of Chancellors (past and present) to continually take advantage of our pensions is hugely damaging.

He told me on Friday: ‘As retirement savers we put money into a long-term savings vehicle that we won’t have access to until our mid-50s. ‘The least we deserve in return for such a long-term commitment is an assurance from the government that the tax treatment of our pensions will not be changed, particularly to plug holes in the public finances.’

Edward believes that the IHT raid on inheritance pensions, along with all other attacks dating back to Gordon Brown’s £5bn-a-year tax raid on company pensions in 1997, has now made private pensions ‘unattractive for current and future savers’.

He fears that the result of this growing antipathy will be that more people will turn to the State in old age, ‘creating a huge social problem for the future’.

Edward’s vision is more fiscally dystopian than mine, but he raises an important point that the Chancellor should consider. Dealing with pensions is in no one’s interest, including the public purse.

Rail fare increases above inflation were hidden in documents published with the budget

Fares up but rail still failing

Wednesday’s announcement of above-inflation rail fare increases (hidden in documents published with the Budget) will overwhelm many commuters.

If there was evidence of an increase in the reliability and quality of train services, the 4.6 per cent increase in the price of many tickets from March would be acceptable. But despite the generous wage awards recently given to railway workers, I see nothing.

I am constantly disappointed by SWR and GWR, the providers of services I rely on for my daily commute.

Late trains and canceled trains (especially on Monday morning) are normal. Yet the pain they cause – including ear damage from the constant reminder that anyone traveling without a ticket on a plane could face fines and criminal charges – pales in comparison to the pain Arriva’s CrossCountry regularly inflicts on me on the weekends.

I use the Bournemouth to Manchester service to travel to watch my football team WBA play. But this is like playing the lottery; Winning (on-time service) is a rare occurrence.

My last trip was a nightmare. CrossCountry was running a four-car service instead of eight, although I was warned when booking tickets that the train would be busy with Bournemouth fans heading to their team’s match against Aston Villa. From where? This meant that when it shook in Reading it was packed to the rafters and packed with people standing in the corridors. My wife refused to get in and went home.

Somehow, I managed to get into my reserved seat, but only after getting someone out of there. It was a truly awful and claustrophobic journey.

To add to the misery, the return train arrived more than 30 minutes late. Third World travel at premium prices. My compensation request has been accepted but no payment has been made yet.

PayPal is 2nd class when it comes to fraud

Online scammers don’t care about controversial Budgets. Their only purpose is to rip us off.

Doug Brodie, founder of London-based Chancery Lane Retirement Income Planning, has seen his share of scams and is always tipping me off about them. Most are fake corporate bonds offering ridiculously high interest rates.

But the last one was in response to him ordering mail online from Royal Mail so he could send an envelope to the US.

He says everything is going well; He paid online and arranged for the letter to be received. But later that day he received an email, purportedly from Royal Mail, saying the delivery was ‘pending’ and a £23 fee would need to be paid. A link took him to the PayPal page where he was asked to pay. Doug has been too long on the scam to fall for such a ruse (it was a giveaway that the PayPal payment request was $23 – not £23 as in the email).

Like a good citizen, he attempted to report the fraud to PayPal, fearing that others might fall into this trap. However, he did not allow it without giving the username of the PayPal account he was directed to. Apparently, the fraudster did not provide this detail.

“This is so frustrating,” said Doug. ‘PayPal must crack down on scammers and listen to people who receive fraudulent payment requests.’

On Friday, PayPal said it takes payment security ‘very seriously’. Anyone receiving a spoofed email is advised to send it to [email protected]. Royal Mail said it would never email a customer requesting payment. So if you receive such a request, it is a scam.