CHANCELLOR DANCES TO A NEW TUNE; THE CREDIT CRISIS BUDGET Spend now, pay later Budget will leave us with pounds 1trillion debt MAGUIRE'S VERDICT.

Byline: MAGUIRE

STRICTLY Come Spending's Alistair Darling bet the ranch on cha-chachaing Britain out of recession.

Never again can the Chancellor or partner Gordon Brown be accused of dithering or bottling a challenge.

To splurge pounds 20billion to get an economy on its knees back on its feet is one fandango of a gamble.

Succeed and the pair will be more popular than John Sergeant. Fail and Labour will be booed off the stage, sent packing by voters. Every day clear blue water opens between the two main parties.

Darling's spend now-pay later Budget is the boldest of modern times, nailing Jim Callaghan who 30 years ago claimed you couldn't spend your way out of a recession.

In the Tory recessions of the 1980s Maggie Thatcher and John Major slashed spending and put up taxes with devastating results as entire communities were destroyed. Darling is offering help for families, pensioners, small businesses, the jobless and homebuyers.

Spending pounds 12.5billion on a VAT cut doesn't add up for me, turning the pound shop into a 97.5p store unlikely to have shoppers queuing.

A bigger boost to public spending, particularly schools and hospitals, would deliver more jobs for the bucks. As would channelling more cash to poorer families and pensioners who spend nearly everything they get.

But Darling's done his sums and all except his political enemies have a vested interest in him pulling this off.

Shadowy Chancellor George Osborne enjoyed a good day tactically by shouting abuse. Strategically the Tory had little worthwhile to offer.

The 45p top income tax rate on those earning over pounds 3,000 a week won't make Britain fairer but is a trap for the Tories. The taboo on requiring the rich to share the burden is broken and Cameron & Co will at some point have to show whose side they're on.

Darling's admission that National Insurance will go up after the election is honest politics. Sinking one trillion into the red at pounds 1,000,000,000,000 is the longest run of noughts in the history of national debt and will need to be cut. Yet the FTSE 100 closing on its biggest rise delivered a more considered verdict than Osborne's verbals. Britain is in recession and the first six months of next year will be terrible with unemployment soaring.

Recovery should be underway in the second half of next year with the economy bouncing back in 2010, handy for the General Election.

Darling deserves credit for coming out fighting. Labour's hoping clueless Osborne and David Cameron will sink deeper into that clear blue water.