Put aside all the post-match analysis of David Cameron’s speech: the most intriguing
story in the papers this morning is this one in the FT. It claims that the Treasury is working on plans
to “reprofile” the spending cuts, which basically means “delay” them. The idea would be to push the bulk of the cuts back to the end of this Parliament. And the underlying
concern is, apparently, that early cuts could trigger various financial penalties, such as those for breaking contracts. The paper even suggests that ministers are worried that, “deep deficit
reduction in 2011-12 could undermine the fragile recovery.”
The Treasury have firmly denied the story, and I’d certainly be surprised if we saw significant delays in the cuts. For starters, it would undermine the coalition’s argument just as they’ve hit on a good one: that paying out £120 million a day in debt interest payments is a moral, as well as a fiscal, failure.
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