Spending review: Osborne must ditch targets to balance books, warns report

If chancellor wants government to 'do more with less' he must halt expensive projects, prioritise manifesto pledges and make cuts more sensibly, IFG says

The government must use the forthcoming spending review to kill off some of its costly projects and to ditch unrealistic targets such as doubling UK exports if it wants to balance the books this decade, a report warns.

The Institute for Government (IFG) thinktank raises concerns over ministers and civil servants' ability to manage what will be an unprecedented decade of austerity as the chancellor, George Osborne, demands they "deliver more with less".

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