The chancellor was quick to pass the blame in his Budget speech. But many of the problems have been caused by his own actions and he offered little to improve the situation today
George Osborne delivered this year’s Budget with a lot of shouting – but the sound and fury disguises the essentially do little nature of his proposals. The main, modest, changes he proposes mostly do not kick in for two, three or four years, when most agree what we need is action now to kick-start the economy.
Like the Chancellor’s rather shouty delivery, growth in the economy continues to be choked off and is forecast to continue to be stuttering.
Much of this is as result of the Chancellor’s own actions – by cutting public spending too quickly but also, and even more importantly, by convincing businesses and households that in 2010 we were on the brink of financial collapse, fatally undermining business and consumer confidence.
Osborne continues to blame anyone and anything for the British economies poor performance, except himself and his policies. It is true that world, and especially European, economic performance has been poor – but this is also because of austerity policies the Chancellor has supported. Other parts of the world not pursing reckless austerity are doing better.
The only real surprise in the Budget is the size of the massive Whitehall underspend of £11bn – including under-spending on investments. This is a sign not of good but of very poor control over spending. This money was intended to provide public services people rely on – to fail to deliver them will be a disaster for many.
This post first appeared on Colin Talbot’s blog Whitehall Watch
