Daily Mail

Hammond hints at NHS cash boost

- By Deputy Political Editor

PHILIP Hammond yesterday cleared the way for an NHS giveaway in the Autumn Budget as he signalled he could be ready to loosen the purse strings within months.

The Chancellor ruled out extra spending in tomorrow’s Spring Statement, but said there was ‘light at the end of the tunnel’. He suggested both the Ministry of Defence and NHS could get cash boosts in the Budget later this year.

Mr Hammond said debt was still too high and had to be brought down. ‘There is light at the end of the tunnel because what we are about to see is debt starting to fall after it has been growing for 17 continuous years. That is a very important moment for us but we are still in the tunnel at the moment,’ he told the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show. ‘ We have a debt of £1.8trillion – 86.5 per cent of our GDP. All the internatio­nal organisati­ons recognise that is higher than the safe level.’

Economists expect Mr Hammond to announce that borrowing is set to be around £7billion lower in 2017-18 than had been predicted. But he made clear that he would not be making any changes to spending in his statement.

‘If there is ... the space to do something, we will decide in the autumn how we are going to use that,’ he said.

The Chancellor added that he accepted there were financial pressures on defence, and told ITV’s Peston on Sunday that ministers were close to finalising a pay deal with NHS workers in England that would give many their first substantia­l salary increase since 2010.

ANOTHER day, another grotesque caricature of those who voted for Brexit as selfish racists.

Yesterday it was the turn of Lib Dem leader Vince Cable, who says the hopes of young people have been crushed by older voters ‘ nostalgic for a world where passports were blue, faces were white and the map was coloured imperial pink’.

It’s a contemptib­le smear. If Sir Vince really wants to see places where the hopes of the young have been crushed, he should visit Greece, Spain, or Italy – where a third of young people are unemployed.

The reason for their misery? Being shackled to the sclerotic, unreformab­le EU. HIGHER growth, productivi­ty and manufactur­ing output than forecast and record numbers in employment. For all the Brexit scaremonge­rs, the UK economy is in remarkably resilient shape. But a word of warning to Chancellor ‘ Spreadshee­t Phil’ Hammond as he prepares his Spring Statement. Don’t ruin it all by taxing small businesses and hardworkin­g families – and adding to our eyewaterin­g national debt by opening up the public spending taps.

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