George Osborne, Chancellor of the Exchequer has said that the UK will not be borrowing more money in the 2012 March budget to cut taxes or reduce spending cuts.
The government is currently ahead of schedule in its programme to cut borrowing, but the poor growth in the economy is not doing anything to ease the burden for Osborne, who has seen calls from the business sector for tax cuts to stimulate growth amid a bleak forecast for 2012.
George Osborne said: “Any tax cut would have to be paid for… there would have to be a tax rise somewhere else or a spending reduction… What we are not going to do in this budget is borrow more money to either increase spending or cut taxes.”
The Labour Party has urged Osborne to cut VAT while the Liberal Democrats want him to raise the threshold at which people start paying taxes.