PoliticsChancellor George Osbornegeorge osbornebudget 2014

Budget 2014: George Osborne's 7 Broken Promises On The Economy

7 Broken Budget Promises George Osborne Would Rather You Didn't Notice
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By 

Business reporter, Huffington Post UK

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George Osborne is set to use his Budget on Wednesday to argue that his austerity strategy has been vindicated and to sketch out a rosy financial future, post-2015, under a Conservative majority government.

The UK economy is set to grow faster than any G7 nation, inflation and interest rates have remained low and unemployment is falling.

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George Osborne with his budget box

However, the awkward truth that the chancellor will not want to mention is that while the UK economy is finally nearing recovery, it has taken much longer than planned with a fair few promises broken along the way. Goalposts have been shifted and, as a result, austerity has to go on longer.

HuffPostUK has collected together seven key pledges broken by Osborne since 2010 that the chancellor probably won't be dwelling on while he delivers his Budget speech on Wednesday afternoon.

George Osborne's Budget Broken Promises
Osborne won't eliminate the deficit by 2015 (01 of07)
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George Osborne promised in the 2010 emergency budget to eliminate the budget deficit by 2015-2016, but had to awkwardly move the target in his Autumn Statement last December to 2018-2019. Meanwhile, the deficit will be £79 billion in 2015.
Growth is half what Osborne promised(02 of07)
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In November 2010, the OBR forecast that the UK economy would grow by 8.4% from the last quarter of 2010 to the last quarter of 2013.How far did it actually grow? Barely half that, at 3.8%.
Osborne has failed to stop debt rising by 2015(03 of07)
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Osborne pledged to ensure that debt was falling by 2015-2016 in his first budget, but now is set to see debt only start to fall by 2016-2017.
Unemployment remains higher than expected(04 of07)
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Osborne said in 2010 that the unemployment rate, the percentage of the economically active population out of work, would be at 6.1% in 2015.Sadly, now he's predicting that it will be 7%, despite the proliferation of zero-hours contracts and the rise of self-employed workers.
Osborne failed to protect Britain's AAA credit rating(05 of07)
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Despite Osborne making a big deal of how important it was to keep Britain's AAA credit rating, Fitch and Moody's agencies stripped the UK of its triple A credit rating in a withering assessment of its economic outlook.
Osborne's export-led economy hasn't arrived yet(06 of07)
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"Our policy is to raise from the ruins of an economy built on debt a new, balanced economy where we save, invest and export," he told MPs in 2010. Last week, he told Andrew Marr: "We don’t export enough, we don’t invest enough, we don’t build enough, we don’t make enough."
Osborne failed to keep living standards risings(07 of07)
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The Tories promised in their 2010 manifesto to forge an economy where everyone's standard of living "rises steadily and sustainably."Yet according to Labour, workers are £1,600 off since May 2010. as ONS figures showed that wages have been remorselessly eaten away by inflation.
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