i caught up with the united kingdom's top finance minister, chancellor of the exchequer george osborne his government's approach to shoring up the uk economy. >> i inherited as chancellor the largest budget deficit in the g-20. and we've taken a series of steps, increased some taxes, some consumption taxes and some cuts in public expenditure which have put us on a path to eliminate the structural deficit in a period of four years. but we also addressed the other question which people were asking which is okay, you can do that, but can you also grow? and the economic forecast for the uk showed that the uk has got a path of sustainable growth over the next four years of 2% a year. >> let me move on to the uk's support of ireland. what are the implications of the debt crisis on the uk? >> it's clearly in the uk's interest that we have a stable irish economy. now i think the package put together on sunday will do that. the package involves the imf and other european countries and a bilateral loan from the uk. that will help take the sovereign out of the debt markets for a couple of years a

who decided that george osborn would be the exchequer? >> the prime minister appeared entirely his decision. >> how much -- how many jobs does the prime mr. phil? >> he fills -- does the prime minister phfill? >> if a particular wants them income he puts them into the house of lords, which he can do quickly. >> what is the restraint on the number of people you can put in the house of lords? >> there is no real restraint. you would be very much criticized if you put too many and, as mr. brown and mr. blair are criticized today. but there are no legal constraints. they can have -- if they have the nerve to do it, they can do it. >> how long is your assignment as a lord? >> for life. >> the two categories of the people in the house of lords in my time have been on a limited tenure, the church leaders. the bishops have to give up when they cease to be bishops. the judges as well. our supreme court was a part of the house of lords of to -- house of lords up to two years ago. >> how is the supreme court justice appointed? " we have an independe

crisis of dealing with the kinds of cuts that the coalition is recommending and the cuts that george osborneand david cameron are recommending will somehow split the coalition between liberal and tori? >> i'm not sure that's the biggest issue. i think liberals made a decision the. they decided the first time a hundred years outside wartime they decided to join a coalition with the conservative party. so the map of british progressive politics has changed. when tony and i were leaders they always had the liberal party saying they were more progressive than labour, that they were to the left of the labour party. never can they say that anymore. so i think what's going to happen is there is a progressive majority in britain. it's going to reform not around liberals and labour but around the new labour part yea. a lot of liberals i think will desert the coalition as supporters of it because they voted for the scooter libby ral party at the last election not expecting a coalition government. so there was a huge opportunity for progressive politics in this country. i want us to succeed in building

whether we want to be in this club and it's ironic that we're not even in the euro zone and we have george osborne of course playing under seven billion pounds now of course that's to protect banks like the rollback of scotland but we've already bailed out the royal bank of scotland wants the british taxpayer and i'm no great union supporter normally but i actually agree with people on board pro at the moment using charge of the. union the trade drug trade drives the train workers union when he says it's not his members who got us into this mess it's the bankers and politicians are the larger you know but it's his members who are paying for. just like the students who are protesting it's them who ended up having to pay for it is what know we taxpayers and we've already bailed out of the us once and lloyds bank now we're bailing them out again effectively by the back door of ireland and the british people haven't been asked about this you know david cameron came to power i mean we're going to ring fence the n.h.s. and we're going to ring fence for a night but he didn't just ring fence for eight he'

who decided that george osborn would be the chancellor of the exchequer? >> it would be the prime minister. >> how much appointment power does the prime minister have? how many different jobs does he or she fell? >> he fills virtually the whole of the government. >> how many would that be? >> about 100 appointments. >> to all those come from the house of commons? >> yes. if he wants them in, he puts them into the house of lords which he can do quickly. >> was the restraint on the number of people he can put on the house of lords? >> there is no real restraint. you would be very much criticized if you put too many interests mr. brown and mr. blair are criticized today. there is no legal constraint. if they have the nerve to do it, they can do it. >> how long is the appointment as a lord? >> for life. the two categories of people in the house of lords that in my time had been on a limited tenure have been the church leaders, the bishops. they have to give up when they cease to be bishops. and the judges because our supreme court was part of the house of lord

if you work for the chancellor of the exchequer, george osborne, versus the treasury secretary in theunited states, what would be speechwriting be like? >> i suspect the speech writing process would be similar. it depends on the person. there are some leaders who are very careful about their speeches in the want everyone to have seen it before hand. i suspect they are in the minority. most of these guides get in there, and they have people they trust. the people at the u.s. treasury would be tearing their hair out because larry and i would be discussing his crucial speeches at 3:00 in the morning. i suspect that is similar. what is interesting is the u.k. treasury is much more powerful and the u.k. than the u.s. treasury is. i was amazed -- i should have known this going in. but when i went to the u.s. treasury, i was surprised about how important it is. -- important -- impotent it is. the budget the produces and january is kindly received, and then promptly ignored. the chancellor stands up on a certain day, you saw the report i did on the day in the spring when this happened. they s

[applause] but we face, now, george osborne 's cuts which we face in a very few weeks and these wille cuts of a magnitude that we have not seen in our lifetime and thrsk is no question that we would have had to take tough action on the deficit, but let us be clear and let us keep repeating, these are not inevitable cuts caused by labor issues, these are ideological cuts. it is the intention to cut back the welfare state once and for all. host: there's a lot in that we can talk about, but start with your parents. when did they come to great britain? guest: my parents were amongst the first wave of westerners that came to the country. they came to britain in 1951, both from the same village in rural jamaica and came to london separately but met and fell in love and married. my father worked in a factory all his life and my mother was a nurse. they, themselves, had left school at 14 but they instilled in me the importance of hard work, the importance of aspiration and the importance of getting an education. host: how did you get into cambridge? guest: i went to local public schools, ord

george osborn is meeting with the bank at the moment. i would stress all the things that are already done such as the bank levy, the regulation of bank bonuses, the fact that the banks have signed up to make sure they pay proper taxes, but we do want to see progress, and we want to see an expansion of small business lending, so i think on this issue we will work through the issue, we will come to a good resolution, and i think that is a demonstration of how the government works. he was very apologetic this morning, and i agree he had every reason to be, but it is true that some things he said were not true, but do we have disagreements and arguments and work them out in private and then make an announcement in public? yes, we do, and i would say to judge the coalition on the work it does and the changes we are making. it is a substantial program. you could not do that if you did not have a working relationship and a strong team. >> do you disagree with that? >> i get on extremely well. there are other issues we were resolving. i find wit

we're talking to george osborne, last night we passed a tax deal that blows another trillion dollar hole in the deficit. >> good stuff. good time. >> mike barnicle, it's a shocker, people like the bill. >> they do. who doesn't like a bill with a tax cut. >> here is the candy cane. by the way, 100% depreciation on clowns at kids' parties. write it all off. >> you can write it all off. also, willie, i know this is important to you. those meat sinks you want in your double-wide, you can do it. the government writing the hole thing out. >> what is a mink sink. >> a sink lined in mink. the giveaways are outrageous. >> that's why i laughed when it's approved. 60% of americans -- >> they are giving them money. it's like wilford brimly inco cocoon, daffodils, you smile all day and live forever. who is not for tax cuts. who is not for benefits you give away for free. >> so interesting the difference between what britain is doing and we're doing. they are essentially doing let's fix the budget deficit first. that will get us to grow. we're saying let's do stimulus and maybe we'll get around to the

understandably george osborne, the new chancellor, the new finance minister came in and said we've got to start bringing this down. i think what worries people is although there is money going to people who especially -- poorer people with big families and in the center of london or for them to find a house, to have their rent paid, can be a lot of money. can be tens of thousands of pounds a year. people say hang on. why are they getting it when i'm struggling to pay my mortgage or struggling to pay my rent? but if you only cut the benefits without doing very much to increase the stock of cheaper housing, and we have a very shortage of housing, particularly in london, then you are putting a lot of people, possibly out on the streets. certainly you're making them move out of london. this is one of those things that was identified early on. if they cut money out -- we can see why they would want to reduce the bill. but you can see why they don't want any stories of people sitting in palatial mansions at the government's expense. if you make it very difficult for poorer people to live in

if you work for the chancellor of the exchequer, george osborne, versus the treasury secretary in the united states, what would be speechwriting be like? >> i suspect the speech writing process would be similar. it depends on the person. there are some leaders who are very careful about their speeches in the want everyone to have seen it before hand. i suspect they are in the minority. most of these guides get in there, and they have people they trust. the people at the u.s. treasury would be tearing their hair out because larry and i would be discussing his crucial speeches at 3:00 in the morning. i suspect that is similar. what is interesting is the u.k. treasury is much more powerful and the u.k. than the u.s. treasury is. i was amazed -- i should have known this going in. but when i went to the u.s. treasury, i was surprised about how important it is. -- important -- impotent it is. the budget the produces and january is kindly received, and then promptly ignored. the chancellor stands up on a certain day, you saw the report i did on the day in the spring when this happened. they

you promised george osborn was when to announce the cuts. what are people coming to you in this advice session that is a direct result of the cuts? >> they are very frightened. they're very frightened for their jobs. they believe this government is when to make a very big cut in jobs in the public sector. some government departments will lose 20% or 30%. most people in my district to work or for the government in some form or fashion, hospitals, schools, government departments, and they're very frightened for their jobs. that is the big thing. >> what special payments are there in this country for their children or older people -- old people? >> in this country, we have benefit payments for unemployed people. obviously, we pay an old age pension to the elderly. again, the other thing people are worried about apart from their jobs as the fact that they will cut all of these benefits and people are worried about how they will manage and how much worse the situation will get. >> how much does an older person who retires get a pension? how was i