Public Sector Borrowing Falls Slightly

The total amount of public sector net borrowing has fallen to £120.6bn over the last financial year, according to the Office for National Statistics.

The figure was slightly lower than the previous tax year's £120.9bn and the independent Office for Budget Responsibility's forecast.

Borrowing also fell in March - by £1.6bn on a year earlier to £15.1bn - as spending cuts across Government departments kicked in.

The totals exclude the cost of bank bailouts, cash transfers from the Government's quantitative easing programme and a boost from the Royal Mail pension assets.

Chancellor George Osborne is likely to welcome the figures after a difficult week in which his austerity programme was criticised by the International Monetary Fund .

Fitch Ratings also became the second agency to strip Britain of its triple-A credit rating .

A Treasury spokeswoman said: "Though it is taking time, the Government is fixing this country's economic problems.

"The deficit is down by a third, a million and a quarter new private sector jobs have been created and interest rates are at near-record lows, benefiting households and businesses."

But Deutsche Bank's UK economist George Buckley said the UK's public finances remained a concern.

"We've seen another downgrade over the past week ... it's going to take a long time to get back to where the Government would like it to be in terms of the underlying fiscal deficit," he said.

The falls in borrowing - although "encouraging" - come after three years of austerity, he said, adding: "There's a long way to go yet."

Investec's Victoria Clarke said: "The Chancellor just made it in under the OBR's forecast, albeit by the skin of his teeth.

"The bigger test will be if he can continue to meet the forecasts for the years ahead, and we think it's looking vulnerable because of the weakness of the euro area, which could decrease tax revenues and mean higher spending pressures."