Budget 2015 was yet another let-down for fiscal conservatives and opponents of big government, not that this beleaguered group have come to expect any better after five years of Conservative-LibDem coalition rule.

The fact that the Tories are actually happy that the media is reporting that government will “only” shrink back to 2000-era levels (when New Labour ruled the roost) is definitive proof that Britain is not still in thrall to Thatcherism and pro-market conservatism, as some left wing commentators suggest, but rather is clinging petulantly and fearfully to Gordon Brown-style Big Government largesse.

This blog has little sympathy with a modern Conservative Party too afraid to forcefully make the case for small government and lower public spending, and will continue to criticise David Cameron and George Osborne for their timidity in this regard for as long as they remain in office. But the Conservative Party does not operate in a vacuum, and should not bear all of the blame.

When in government, Conservatives have to deal with a public that is used to big government, collectivism and intrusive state involvement in almost every aspects of their lives. Britain never had the pioneering, fiercely independent spirit that characterises America, and the modern institutions that emerged from the post-war consensus (the welfare state and National Health Service) only shifted our political centre of gravity further to the left.

Thus, the BBC’s Robert Peston can ask with a straight face, when analysing George Osborne’s 2015 Budget (emphasis added):

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