Editing Chancellor of the Exchequer (section)

===Budget box===
[[File:Cropped Gladstone's Red Box.jpg|thumb|right|Budget box or Gladstone box, {{circa}} 1860]]
The chancellor traditionally carries their [[Budget Day|budget speech]] to the House of Commons in a particular [[Red box (government)|red despatch box]].  The so-called 'Budget Box' is identical to the cases used by all other government ministers (known as ministerial boxes or "despatch boxes") to transport their official papers, but is better known because the chancellor traditionally displays the box, containing the budget speech, to the press before leaving 11 Downing Street for the House of Commons.

The original budget box was first used by [[William Ewart Gladstone]] in 1853 and continued in use until 1965 when [[James Callaghan]] was the first chancellor to break with tradition when he used a newer box. Prior to Gladstone, a generic red despatch box of varying design and specification was used. The practice is said to have begun in the late 16th century, when Queen [[Elizabeth I]]'s representative [[Francis Throckmorton]] presented the Spanish Ambassador, [[Bernardino de Mendoza]], with a specially constructed red briefcase filled with [[black pudding]]s.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/uk-news/what-budget-box-red-21981804|title=What is the Budget Box? Why is it red?|date=27 October 2021|newspaper=Birmingham Mail|access-date=4 February 2022}}</ref>

In July 1997, Gordon Brown became the second chancellor to use a new box for the Budget. Made by industrial trainees at Babcock Rosyth Defence Ltd ship and submarine dockyard in Fife, the new box is made of yellow pine, with a brass handle and lock, covered in scarlet leather and embossed with the Royal cypher and crest and the chancellor's title. In his [[2007 United Kingdom budget|first Budget]], in March 2008, Alistair Darling reverted to using the original budget box and his successor, George Osborne, continued this tradition for his first budget, before announcing that it would be retired due to its fragile condition.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2011/mar/21/budget-chancellors-red-box|title=Bye-bye budget box, hello backpack|date=21 March 2011|website=The Guardian}}</ref> The key to the original budget box has been lost.<ref>{{cite book |first=Alistair |last=Darling |title=Back from the Brink |year=2011}}</ref>