Clegg Says U.K. Deficit Cuts Intended to Avert ‘Market Panic’

Just in case you thought the new Deputy Prime Minister knows anything about monetary operations.

To avoid the non existent probability of becoming the next Greece they can take action to increase the real probability they become the next Japan:

Clegg Says U.K. Deficit Cuts Intended to Avert ‘Market Panic’

June 24 (Bloomberg) — Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg said the U.K. could have been the next victim of a “market panic” sweeping Europe if the government had not raised valued-added tax.

Defending Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne’s June 22 decision to raise the tax to 20 percent from 17.5 percent, which Clegg’s Liberal Democrats had campaigned against during for last month’s election, the deputy prime minister said the government faces a “black hole” in the public finances that is “even bigger than we thought.”

“The truth is that the world had changed very dramatically in recent weeks,” Clegg told BBC News today. “We’ve got this sort of economic firestorm on our doorstep in Europe, where the markets are putting huge pressure on one country after the next, knocking on the door in Greece, in Spain, in Portgual, and so on.”

“There’s a real worry that if we don’t take action now, that we will be the next victim, if you like, of that kind of market panic,” he said.