European Union Backs UK Budget Cuts

The European Union’s executive body, which is the European Commission, on Tuesday praised the UK’s ambitious plans to reduce public spending, which was announced in the budget last month. The body says that the plans are on track to cut the country’s mountain of debt and still allow growth.

The Labour government was criticized before elections by the European Union for not doing more to tackle the nation’s deficit, which is the gap between yearly revenue and spending. The UK is set to have one of the largest deficits in the bloc this year, with an expected 11% of gross domestic product.

All of the European Union governments have agreed since the criticism that they will begin to cut their deficits, taking on individual deadlines to see the deficits to less than 3% of GDP, and many of them have announced austerity plans as well. Britain has the longest deadline – the 2014-15 fiscal year.

In Prime Minister David Cameron’s emergency budget, he pledged to reduce the country’s budget deficit by 1.5% during this fiscal year, and if the plans are rolled out as planned, they will be able to reduce the deficit to 2.3% of GDP by the deadline. Olli Rehn, the monetary affairs commissioner for the European Union, said that these cuts are in line with the strategy.

The Commission said that fiscal consolidation in the UK won’t be easy, as 75% of the deficit’s reduction is to come from spending cuts, which includes a 25% cut in most of the government’s departmental budgets over the next four years. However, they say that confidence will be boosted in Britain’s commitment to get their public finances back on track if the measures are implemented as planned.