CITY AM – On The Hunt

Hunt has raided the piggy-bank for his tax cuts. Will it work?

CITY AM SAYS As the dust settles on Jeremy Hunt’s Autumn Statement, it has become increasingly clear that the Chancellor has taken a big bet.

Hunt has effectively banked the windfall from higher inflation, which has boosted tax receipts, without being completely honest about the spending cuts that the government will have to make after the next election.

On the Treasury’s current spending plans, non-ringfenced departments are set for a real terms spending cut on par with the years of austerity under Cameron and Osborne.

Many economists have said this is completely unrealistic. Paul Johnson, director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), said the spending plans were “questionable, if not plain implausible”.

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