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The International Monetary Fund reduced its growth forecast for Britain this year from 1.5 per cent to 1.1 per cent and for next year from 2.3 to 1.6 per cent. A debate rumbled on in government about whether to spend more money on public infrastructure works as dark financial clouds loomed. ‘What I will not do is provide cover for ideological descendants of those who sent children up chimneys,’ Vince Cable, the Business Secretary told the Liberal Democrat conference in Birmingham, in a speech warning of ‘difficult times ahead’ for Britain’s finances. Danny Alexander, the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, told the conference that the better off should pay more tax. Oxford University has licensed a Hong Kong company to sell branded merchandise including a £780 ‘Tutor Chair’ with Dominus Illuminatio Mea printed on it.
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A scheme to set up nine regional fire service control-rooms failed after £469 million had been spent, the Commons public accounts committee reported, yet most of those responsible ‘have suffered no hindrance to their careers’.
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