In an interview with BBC Radio, after unveiling his spending review on Wednesday, the chancellor said he had listened to critics after he abandoned altogether his plans to cut £4.4bn from tax credits. Under the new benefit, spending on welfare for working-age Britons would fall to a 30-year low as a share of national income.
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Autumn Statement: business rate relief boost “As part of a bold plan to rebalance the economy and to devolve power back to local leaders, the Chancellor, in the Autumn Statement, outlined his plans to enable local government to be self-sufficient by the end of the Parliament”.
“Core funding is expected to reduce by 24% over the next few years, and this is on top of the cuts of 40% or so that we’re already managing”.
“What is clear is that the process of reform and modernisation of West Midlands Police will continue”. “The police protect us, and we’re going to protect the police”.
“This is not the end of austerity”, he said.
Universal credits – the new system that will eventually replace tax credits – remain totally unchanged following yesterday’s announcement.
In his speech to MPs in the House of Commons, Osborne said: “I’ve had representations that these changes to tax credits should be phased in”.
Paul Johnson from the Institute for Fiscal Studies said: “He’s got a bit lucky with some of the changes to tax receipt forecasts”.
But the opposition Labour Party slammed Osborne for “betraying” the voters after promising to eliminate Britain’s budget deficit by 2015.
GEORGE Osborne’s cuts will keep hammering the working poor despite his humiliating tax credit U-turn, economic experts warn.
When he announced a cut to tax credits, the chancellor created a flawless storm, not only causing outrage among working families, many of them traditional Tory voters but also angering his own backbenchers who had to bear the brunt of public fury.
IFS figures showed that by 2020, 2.6 million working families would lose on average 1,600 pounds ($2,420) in benefits a year and 1.2 million non-working households would lose 2,500 pounds.
Mr Osborne said that over the course of the Parliament the Government would borrow £8 billion less than previously forecast while spending £12 billion more on capital investment.
“We have never before been in a place where a Chancellor will pursue a surplus for no evident economic gain”.
Osborne also announced plans to limit the amount that could be paid in housing benefits for new applicants, and to stop housing and top-up pension payments to people who have left the country for more than a month.
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There were “still some very significant cuts ahead”, with day-to-day spending in Whitehall departments – with the exception of protected areas like the NHS, aid, defence and schools – falling by 18% by 2019/20.
