Britain Makes Huge Cuts to Avert Debt Crisis

29 June 2010

Photo: AP

Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne holds his Budget Box as he poses for the media outside his official residence at 11 Downing Street in central London, 22 Jun 2010

Britain's new coalition government has passed an emergency budget after warning the state of the country's finances is much worse than anticipated.

The Clapham Park Estate was once voted one of the worst social housing developments in London. The window frames are crumbling, the apartments are dark and damp and the estate suffers from high levels of crime, drug use and unemployment. Many of the residents are reliant on state handouts to get by. It is places like this that could be hit hardest by cuts in housing and social benefit.

The apartment blocks were due to be demolished and rebuilt, but the money has run out. Vernon de Maynard is chair of the local residents' association.

"We are asking when we are going to get decent homes," he said. "They tell us 2016, or 2017 plus ... so again it is the little person at the bottom of the scale who gets it in the neck."

Britain's new chancellor, George Osborne of the Conservative Party, claims the previous Labor Party administration took the country to the edge of bankruptcy.

In an emergency budget he outlined, public spending will be slashed by one quarter over five years, heralding widespread job losses in the public sector and cuts to Britain's welfare state.