The Spectator

Portrait of the week | 3 July 2010

The government’s committee on public expenditure, otherwise known as Pex or the Star Chamber, gave departments a month to come up with spending cuts of up to 33 per cent.

issue 03 July 2010

The government’s committee on public expenditure, otherwise known as Pex or the Star Chamber, gave departments a month to come up with spending cuts of up to 33 per cent.

The government’s committee on public expenditure, otherwise known as Pex or the Star Chamber, gave departments a month to come up with spending cuts of up to 33 per cent. Mr George Osborne, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, said he would spend the summer seeking ways to reduce welfare spending in order to cushion the cuts in other areas. Mr Ken Clarke, the Justice Secretary, proposed fewer short jail sentences, which were ‘costly and ineffective’. Sir Hugh Orde, the president of the Association of Chief Police Officers said that, to preserve essential policing tasks in the face of spending cuts, ‘We must guard against the understandable demand for more and more officers on the street.’

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