Budget 2009: Darling under fire
By Ian Dunt
Opposition parties and special interest groups have rounded on Alistair Darling’s Budget, calling it a “fantasy”.
The chancellor announced record levels of borrowing and spending – £175 billion in this year alone.
But opposition parties focused their attacks on government projections of economic recovery, which said the UK could expect to see growth by the winter.
Shadow chief secretary to the Treasury, Philip Hammond told the BBC: “Alistair Darling is predicting 1.25 per cent growth next year. The IMF is saying the economy will still be shrinking next year, 0.4 per cent.
“He’s made a prediction of growth the year after which is frankly fantasy land prediction, and all of that has a huge implication for the scale of the problem that he has to tackle.”
Shadow chancellor George Osborne on the Budget
But Labour returned fire this morning, with Gordon Brown stressing the difficulty of the task the government faced at a panel discussion in North London.
“The point that I think we have got to accept is if we are going to give people opportunities they need for the future, then there has got to be a contribution by those who have the most and who have gained the most over the last few years,” he said.
“This is not taxation for its own sake, it is tax for a purpose. This is Britain fighting back against the international recession, this is Britain taking bold action for recovery.”
Mr Darling told the BBC: “You can’t carry on as if nothing has happened.
“There is a great deal of uncertainty [but] I think our economy will begin to grow.
“What I tried to do yesterday is set out a sensible path that is sustainable,” he continued.
“We need to face up to the fact that we do have a lot of uncertainty out there. To try to write a budget for 2013 would be just plain daft. We have got to live within our means and ensure our finances are sustainable for the long term.”
The chancellor was embarrassed to discover the IMF had put out a significantly more pessimistic assessment of UK finances just minutes after he had sat down yesterday, predicting 4.1 per cent shrinkage this year alone.
