Spare us the cutter

Unite has slammed Chancellor George Osborne’s budget as a failed opportunity from a “one trick Chancellor” – that trick being to cut – because he refuses to take action that would grow our economy.

There is little economic content in it – indeed as Unite general secretary Len McCluskey commented, “Every reputable economic body on the planet has urged him to abandon his clearly counterproductive austerity, decrying his approach as ‘bad economics’.

“Yet still he ploughs on banging the national head against the austerity brick wall, imposing billions more in cuts to services that are already down to the bone.”

In this budget Osborne’s serial failures to meet targets are skated over or simply just not mentioned at all. Like his obsession with austerity and deficit reduction. The budget deficit, despite massive cuts across public services, is still adding to public debt year on year. And yet this is barely mentioned in the budget.

Economic growth has gone from little to worse. There have been years of productivity failure as year after year we have trailed behind our international competitors. Our balance of payments deficit – a measure of economic health – have figures which move between awful and really awful – and remain unmentioned.

As does the NHS funding crisis – in a department which is meant to be ‘protected’ with record NHS deficits and not a single key performance target met. Likewise for the crisis in local government and social care.

A spoonful of distracting sugar tax for some sugar-heavy products might sprinkle the headlines – but it’s hardly fundamental to our future.

Remarkably, the Chancellor waved around a saving subsidy for young earners under 40 but as this group has been punished badly under austerity and most likely to be among those experiencing the boom in zero hours work it is difficult to imagine that this taxpayer-funded boon will benefit anyone but an already lucky few.

Problems not addressed

Yet none of the country’s fundamental problems have been addressed. There is too little infrastructure investment, business investment and not enough quality training. Attacks on further and higher education funding in, for example, technical colleges, make that worse.

The impact of public infrastructure investment can be seen in London and the south east. Where public investment has led, private investment has followed, creating jobs and generating growth.

There are parts of London where you can’t throw a stick without it hitting a building site crane or seeing it drop down a hole in the ground where Crossrail 1 is being built.

Re-announcing Crossrail 2 in the budget, at least the north London powerhouse will power on after Crossrail 1 has been opened.

And as for the ‘Northern Powerhouse’?  There seems to be just the crumbs left on the investment table after the south has eaten most of the cake. ‘Paused’ programmes ‘unpaused’. An extra lane on a road. Maybe a road tunnel.

And none of this is jam tomorrow or even the day after. Crossrail 1 is real in London now. HS3 between Leeds and Manchester – at least 20 years away.

The organisation for economic cooperation and development (OECD) and the international monetary fund (IMF) have both suggested it’s time to make the investment cake that much bigger and much more quickly available.

But as Unite says, Osborne has had only one-trick in his armoury which he has put on ‘repeat’ mode since 2010 – cuts.  In this budget he misses yet more targets, irresponsibly fails manufacturing and continues to bang the nation’s head against the austerity brick wall.

In reaction to the budget Len McCluskey said, “This is a one-trick chancellor – and his one trick is to cut because he refuses to act to grow our economy.

“His claims to be acting to improve the life chances of our young people will stun parents and our members currently fighting to save the children’s centres that have been celebrated for improving social mobility but whose doors are closing thanks to his policies.

“He has had to revise down his own growth targets because his so-called jobs ‘miracle’ is actually a jobs fraud. Real, shared prosperity is impossible in an economy built on low pay and where zero hours jobs have risen by 15 per cent in recent months.

“Working people are still £40 a week poorer because of his policies. His senseless drive to run a surplus by 2020 will be paid for out of the wage packets of people who deserve far better than broken services and a personal debt burden that is the heaviest in the western world.”

Len McCluskey’s full statement is here