Thursday newspaper round-up: Budget reaction

24th Mar 2011 06:29

George Osborne used a £2 billion surprise windfall tax on oil companies to cut the price of petrol in a Budget that also tried to set out a plan for economic growth. The Chancellor, forced to unveil lower growth and higher borrowing forecasts, targeted his limited scope for manoeuvre at family budgets and the burdens on business, reports the Times."A Budget for making things, not making things up," the Chancellor said. To rebalance the economy away from debt-fuelled state spending and an unhealthy reliance on the City of London, to "a Britain carried aloft by the march of the workers". George Osborne pummelled his point home. The word "business" featured 37 times in his hour-long speech. "Big Society" managed just a single mention, noted the Telegraph. Having done "rescue" last year, and with no cash in his red box to give away without squirrelling it back elsewhere, he turned to "reform" - unveiling measures to stimulate enterprise from grass roots apprenticeships through to cuts in corporation tax, the paper says. George Osborne has ignored the warning lights flashing in the British economy delivering a Budget that stuck defiantly to his plan to cut public sector borrowing and fuel private sector growth. "Britain has a plan and we are sticking to it," he said. In spite of rising inflation, lower short-term growth and higher medium-term borrowing, Mr Osborne said his plan to cut the deficit was on track and was essential for realising his ambition of turning Britain into Europe's top business location, says the FT.The squeeze on incomes from inflation and soaring petrol prices and looming government spending cuts are forcing seismic shifts in shoppers' behaviour, Sainsbury's warned yesterday. The supermarket group, which reported unexpectedly poor sales figures that fell well short of City expectations, said that growing economic uncertainty was piling pressure on families, writes the Times.The Bank of England has warned that inflation is in danger of rocketing above 5pc in the coming months, piling more pressure on policymakers to raise interest rates. Its warning will ratchet up fears that inflation is spiralling out of control, fuelled by a step-change in the Bank's position in less than a month, reports the Telegraph. Lloyd Blankfein, chief executive of Goldman Sachs, said that a former board member at his bank violated bank confidentiality when talking to Raj Rajaratnam, the billionaire Galleon fund manager accused of insider trading. Prosecutors allege that Rajat Gupta, the former Goldman Sachs board member, relayed secret information about Goldman's earnings and strategy, often just minutes after board meetings, to Mr Rajaratnam, who then traded on it, the FT reports. The Craddock family of Lincat are more than £20 million richer after the Lincolnshire-based manufacturing company they bought for £7,000 more than three decades ago was sold to an American rival for £58 million cash. Middleby, the acquisitive US catering equipment manufacturer, will use Lincat to expand in Britain. The deal follows its failure three years ago to land Enodis, the fast-food kitchen maker that fell to its rival Manitowoc after a £900 million bid battle, the Times reports.A Slovak businessman is set to make more than $500m (£306m) from the sale of his stake in Russia's eighth-largest bank, which is planning to list in London in the first half of this year. The $700m initial public offering of Nomos Bank is expected to see Roman Korbachka sell his entire holding for about $580m. The float, which Nomos hopes will raise $190m from the sale of new shares and is set to take place before summer, will value the bank at $3.5bn, according to a source close to the deal, reports the Telegraph. Groupon, one of several internet companies that offers users money-off vouchers to spend at local businesses, is looking for a new No 2 executive to steer it through a US stock market flotation after parting ways with its existing chief operating officer. Rob Solomon, who was hired by Groupon just a year ago, is standing aside to allow it to recruit what he called "a nuts and bolts operator to make the trains run on time," according to the Independent.