Gordon Brown before the 2006 budget.
Photograph: Adrian Dennis/AFP/Getty
It is a ritual that has become as familiar as the photograph with the battered, red briefcase: predicting what will be in the annual budget statement.
In truth, there have been times when even the prime minister has not known, while David Cameron today confessed that responding to the budget is his least favourite part of being Tory leader.
In an entry on his weblog, Mr Cameron admitted he would "give a lot" for an accurate leak of what the chancellor would announce tomorrow.
"You get a few pages of the so-called red book an hour or so in advance - and even that has some thick black lines through it.
"The rest is guesswork, judgment and trying to be quick on your feet."
All this has never stopped newspapers printing details of what they believed would be contained in the announcement.
Whether the information has been obtained from "Whitehall insiders" or is simply educated guesswork we shall never know.
But as Gordon Brown prepares to deliver his 11th and almost certainly final budget speech tomorrow, it would seem that old traditions never die.
Read on for this year's predictions.
Business
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