Lib Dems urge Chancellor to change course
Liberal Democrats are breaking with the Government's economic orthodoxy to call for George Osborne to slow his deficit reduction targets and invest in stimulus projects. John Pugh, an MP who helped write the Lib Dems’ economic policy before the 2010 election, has called for ministers to return to the plans set out by Vince Cable, the business secretary, when he was the party’s Treasury spokesman. At the same time, a group of economists who backed austerity measures in 2010 in a letter to The Sunday Times have told the New Statesman the Chancellor should change course and begin borrowing more, arguing that slow growth is more important than debt levels.