Good and bad in Osborne spending plans

“I don’t think it’s a weakness, if you are doing this job, to listen to people and listen to the concerns that are made”, he told ITV1’s Good Morning Britain. “I hear and understand them”.

“The OBR has improved its forecast just a smidgeon on tax receipts going forward”. But he chose to bin his proposals altogether.

Police have welcomed news its funding will not be further cut in yesterday’s government Comprehensive Spending Review.

He said: “We are pleased for the people of London that the government has decided not to cut overall spending on the police”.

However, the Chancellor said there would be a 50% increase in capital investment in transport infrastructure to £61 billion and £2 billion for flood protection, while the science budget would be protected in real terms.

“We now need to push the Government to get the properly funded police force that we need”.

Its analysis of tax, benefit and minimum wage changes announced by the Chancellor since the election shows that the average loss among households in the bottom half of the income distribution is £650, while there is no average loss at all among the top 50%.

The first is that we can’t and shouldn’t cut our welfare budget at all. However, he said the easiest thing would be just to scrap the plans completely, even though that means the Government would miss its planned targets for cutting welfare spending.

He said: “The next three budgets will be the most hard we have had to balance in recent history”. The working tax credits also have a childcare element for those who pay for childcare through a registered childminder or nursery.

It also warned that there could be a “rush” to buy second homes, before a stamp duty increase due to come in April.

Chris continued: “We have already identified significant savings of £211m since 2010 and continue to seek out ways of making efficiencies by working in partnership, being innovative and through early intervention in social care”.

“I was also very pleased that George Osborne has said the Government intends to give commissioners greater flexibility to raise money locally through what we call the precept, or the police element of council tax”.

A “victory for Labour” was how John McDonnell, the shadow chancellor, described Osborne’s change of heart.

He said Mr Osborne’s handling of tax credits had been a “fiasco” and said it was essential to see the detail.

Cuts to universal credit – the benefit set to replace tax credits for most claimants in the last years of the parliament – are to go ahead.

The Department for Transport will see its operational budget cut by 37 per cent, Energy and Climate Change, Business, Innovation and Skills 22 per cent, and Environment 15 per cent.

However, you will only be paid the basic state pension at a level that equates to the eight years you actually paid into the UK Government’s coffers.

Developers could be given billions to build 400,000 new homes in England.