PHILIP Hammond was on his feet for one hour and two minutes during the Budget statement – only the third time in a decade the speech has lasted over an hour.
For his second Budget as Chancellor, Mr Hammond added six minutes to the statement he delivered in March.
Just two other Budget addresses in recent times have been longer, and both were delivered by George Osborne: July 2015 (one hour five minutes) and March 2016 (one hour four minutes).
By contrast, Gordon Brown’s final Budget speech in 2007 was the shortest since 1979 at just 49 minutes.
In the 1980s and early 1990s the Budget speech regularly neared the two-hour mark.
The longest Budget speech in history is thought to be from William Gladstone in April 1853, when he spoke for a record four hours and 45 minutes.
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