Chancellor delivers budget 'for our aspiration nation'

The Chancellor, George Osborne delivered his 2013 budget today in the House of Commons, calling it "a budget for our aspiration nation".

To a packed and noisily partisan Commons chamber, Osborne was forced to announce that the forecast for growth had been downgraded to 0.6% for 2014, a cut of 50% from the Autumn Statement figure, predicted back in December.

Among the key points were a stimulus for the housing market in the form of interest-free loans to potential home owners, a raising of the personal tax allowance to £10,000 from 2014, a year early, a 1% reduction in corporation tax for businesses, a cut in employers' national insurance contributions and tax free childcare vouchers worth £1,200 for working parents.

A further 1% cut in government department budgets would fund some infrastructure investment though schools and health would escape this additional Whitehall financial squeeze.

Investment in shale gas would be promoted with tax incentives, the Chancellor said.

There was controversy when the budget was allegedly leaked to the Evening Standard who had initially published details on its site before the Chancellor had risen to speak.

The target of 2% would remain for inflation while the Chancellor said that he was hopeful the Bank Of England would adopt new policies to help boost the economy in addition to setting interest rates.

Planned fuel and beer duty escalators for this year were both scrapped, with beer duty actually cut by 1p. Rises for other alcohol prices will remain.

Commentators debated the extent to which the deficit, predicted to be 7.4% this year, had fallen but generally agreed that it was falling more slowly than forecast by the Office for Budget Responsibility late last year. The national debt meanwhile is rising more quickly than previously forecast - at 75.9% of GDP this year.

In response to the budget, Labour leader Ed Miliband said: "All he offers is more of the same - higher borrowing and lower growth.

"A more of the same budget from a downgraded chancellor. He is the wrong man in the wrong place at the worst possible time for the country."

George Osborne called it "a budget for people who aspire to work hard and get on" and said "we are slowly but surely fixing our country's economic problems."