Budget 2012: "Unashamedly backs business"

The chancellor made cutting corporation tax, to signal Britain's competitiveness to foreign investors, his first tax-cutting priority. The rate will now fall to 24%, and there will be a further two 1p cuts in the years ahead.

Osborne said his statement was "unashamedly" pro business, setting out a battery of supply-side reforms, from simplified planning rules to public funding for ultra-fast broadband, which the Treasury hopes will help to kick-start economic recovery.

It was announced that the independent Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) now expects economic growth to be slightly higher, at 0.8% this year, up from 0.7% in its autumn forecasts. However, next year, it is projecting 2% growth, slightly weaker than the 2.1% it expected in November.

Osborne stressed that he would stick to the government's aggressive austerity programme, which he said had enabled the Treasury to borrow at the cheapest rates in its history.

Announcing the OBR's latest forecasts for the public finances, he said he now expected this year's deficit to be £126bn - just £1bn lower than expected in the autumn, after official figures published earlier on Wednesday revealed a much larger-than-expected shortfall of more than £15bn in February alone.

In future years, the deficit will come down slightly faster than had been previously expected, to £21bn by 2016-17, instead of the £24bn forecast in November.

The growth forecasts formed the backdrop to a highly political Budget statement, in which Osborne announced a series of well-trailed measures, including a controversial cut to the 50p top rate of income tax for those earning more than £150,000 a year.

Further information
Full details of the Budget have been published at www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/budget2012