In the last budget of the coalition government before the next general elections two months away, Britain’s Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne laid out the achievements of his government, which he said had allowed Britain to “walk tall again” owing to the “national recovery” the country has made since the 2008-09 recession.
He counted the many markers of the economic recovery that his government’s policies had resulted in over the last five years. Quoting figures from the Office for Budget Responsibility, he pointed to faster growth, growing employment, rising living standards, a better business environment, lower budgetary deficit (5 % in 2014-15) and borrowings (80.4 per cent in 2014-15 to 80.2 per cent in the year 2015-16.).
Mr. Osborne said he would cut the deficit by another £30 billion through cuts to welfare (£12 billion), departmental budgets (£13 billion) and from stopping tax avoidance and tax evasion (£5 billion).
Telling the Opposition Labour party that he would “nor accept lessons in fairness” from them, Mr. Osborne said that his government had achieved a “national recovery” both from the recession and from the state of the economy that Labour had left.
Corporation tax of 20 per cent would stay, Mr. Osborne said. Amongst the measures he announced for stimulating the economy are tax breaks for the North Sea oil industry that has been hit by global oil price fall, and major investments in transport projects.
“The budget that won’t be believed,” said Leader of the Opposition Ed Milliband in his reply to Mr. Osborne’s. He pointed to a glaring omission in the budget, namely the absence of any reference to the National Health Service.
The budget makes no departure from the standard Conservative party economic policies said Anna Valero, an economist working at the Centre for Economic Performance at the London School of Economics. “They are sticking to their core policy that emphasises the need for continuing austerity and their stand that we shouldn’t be borrowing even for public investment.”
Ms. Valero told The Hindu that in her view the most glaring omission in the budget was the absence of any reference to productivity in the U.K., which according to a study by her department has stagnated after the 2008-09 recession and remains about 15 per cent below historical trends.
