Brown to announce £12 billion spending cuts today

British prime minister Gordon Brown

British prime minister Gordon Brown is set to unveil today the Labour's plan to trim public spending by £12 billion over four years ahead of the pre-Budget report, the BBC reported today.

"In order to protect the front-line services we value at a time when budgets are tighter, it means we need to do what households up and down the country do to prioritise the necessities and postpone the things we can do without," the prime minister will say in his speech today, the BBC reported.

As part of plans to plug the hole in public finances, the government has delayed its planned comprehensive spending review until after a general election.

According to Brown, ministers have identified £3 billion in additional efficiency savings since the Budget in April. Of that, £1.3 billion will be achieved by streamlining central government, Brown will say, indicating also that certain programmes will have to be delayed or abandoned.

"We have already promised savings of £35 billion a year by 2011 on top of the £26.5 billion a year already delivered through the Gershon review. But by identifying new ways of working - and being prepared to make the tough choices - we can deliver in excess of another £12 billion in efficiency savings over the next four years,'' he will say.

"This includes £3 billion of new efficiency savings identified since the Budget - of which over £1.3 billion will come from streamlining central government."