Osborne will give Budget on 23 March
The Conservative-Liberal Democrat government will present its 2011 budget to parliament on 23 March, chancellor George Osborne said yesterday, proposing changes to the way government spending is dished out.
Osborne foreshadowed tighter checks on a huge part of the budget used for top-up funding by government departments which face swings in unpredictable areas such as social security. Osborne said he hoped next year’s fiscal policy statement would contain details of a new framework for department funding to improve budget discipline across government, as the coalition seeks to cut £81bn from spending over four years.
Osborne also yesterday hinted that a fresh round of so-called ‘quantitative easing’ (QE) could be on the cards.
“The Governor of the Bank of England has observed that robust fiscal policy gives more flexibility to monetary policy, and that is the principle I take to economic policy-making,’ Osborne told the Commons Treasury Select Committee yesterday.