Is this Osborne's New Deal?

MORE than at any other time since he was elevated to his job as chancellor, George Osborne now sounds like he is fully committed to growth for the UK economy with a set of grand measures in the Autumn Statement to get things going.

Make no mistake, as the BBC’s Robert Peston quickly pointed out, this was no Autumn Statement as envisaged by Osborne; this was a mini Budget, if not a full blown affair.

This adds to the sense that Osborne now feels he has to do more and that austerity alone (we know it was just austerity, but it’s a matter of balance) was not working. His critics will renew their claim that austerity was not working and that Osborne has been forced to change tack.

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