Thread: Cameron orders Ministers to draw up 40% spending cuts

Cameron orders Ministers to draw up 40% spending cuts - the biggest in history


By Simon Walters
Daily Mail.co.uk
4th July 2010


David Cameron is ready to approve the biggest public-spending cuts in the history of the developed world in a dramatic bid to cut Â*Britain’s soaring national debt.

He has ordered Cabinet Ministers to draw up ‘Doomsday’ savings of up to a staggering 40 per cent which could see vast parts of the public Â*services shut down and tens of thousands of policemen, teachers, town hall workers and other civil servants lose their jobs.

The proposed cutbacks are even more extreme than emergency reductions used in other countries such as Canada and Ireland and are double the amount of the Geddes cuts imposed after the First World War when Britain faced bankruptcy from government debt and waste.


Doomsday savings: Prime Minister David Cameron is preparing departments for cuts of up to 40 per cent

Mr Cameron’s shock initiative is a massive personal and political gamble.

There were gasps at a meeting of the Cabinet on Tuesday when Ministers were informed of the package.

It could provoke a wave of crippling strikes – and may well threaten Mr Cameron’s alliance with Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg. Many Lib Dem MPs, already unhappy with the VAT rise and cuts in benefits,are likely to rebel against the draconian new measures.

However, if it works, it could result in a Â*second Election victory for the Prime Â*Minister.

The plan to cut public spending by nearly half over four years is revealed in a letter from Treasury Chief Â*Secretary Danny Alexander to Mr Cameron yesterday.

The letter, which has the full backing of Mr Cameron and Chancellor George Osborne, instructs Ministers in most departments to draw up two sets of cuts. One is based on a spending reduction of 25 per cent.


Putting on the squeeze: The depth of cuts were revealed in a letter from Danny Alexander to Mr Cameron

The second – ‘Doomsday’ – Â*scenario demands to know what would Â*happen if they lost 40 per cent of their budget.

Mr Alexander has given the Armed Forces and schools a degree of Â*protection by requiring the Ministry of Defence and the Education Department to draw up two lesser sets of cuts – based on ten per cent and 20 per cent.

The NHS and overseas aid are exempt from the spending purge in line with Mr Cameron’s Election pledge to ring-fence their budgets.

The suggested 40 per cent cut would go even further than last month’s Emergency Budget, when Mr Osborne announced real-term cuts across all Government departments of 25 per cent over four years.

A Treasury spokesman said: ‘Mr Alexander has asked Ministers to provide a range of outcomes and draw up illustrative plans so we can see precisely what the effect of different spending reductions would be.

‘The idea is to say, “If you cut by a) 25 per cent, what would it mean, and if you cut by b) 40 per cent what would it mean?â€

TBOW's GLOBAL LAW 4

DON'T SPEND IT IF YOU DON'T GOT IT....

Of course it will be worded more eloquently but thats the gist of it. Every City, County, State, and Nation on Earth shall have to spend whatever it has taken in the PREVIOUS year. There will be no more forcasting and borrowing, except in very special instances...