Slower growth means extra borrowing of £45bn between now and 2015 (Osborne's message to Britain: forget the cuts, fill up your tank, 24 March). But slower growth is the result of the savage cuts in public spending. So, the government makes cuts to pay off debt, and the result is an extra £45bn in debt. All the pain suffered by the people of Britain in order massively to increase our debt.
The government says the cuts are in the interests of Britain; they are not. They are in the interests of the Tory party. The cuts have to be executed quickly so they are finished before the next general election, people forget and elect the Tories. Britain suffers so that the Tories may win the next election.
Nicholas Maxwell
London
• The government's targets for 40,000 extra apprentices are ambitious and show that it recognises the importance of technical training. But the government cannot create apprenticeships: it simply funds part of their training. This is where these grand schemes fall down.
It will take employers hiring 40,000 more young people before there can be 40,000 more apprenticeships. The job comes before the apprenticeship. Every party believes they can win support by announcing big increases in apprenticeship places and training schemes, but I have yet to see these policies work because so little consideration is given to employers' participation. One of the most revealing statistics that the chancellor gave was that only one in 10 companies offers apprenticeships.
The government has to be prepared to incentivise employers to take on new apprentices and to create the jobs that will give them a career; otherwise the figures announced are meaningless.
Funds for vocational training must be approached imaginatively if we are to capitalise on the talent that is out there, while ensuring that economic growth is backed by much needed trade skills.
Gerard Eadie
Chairman, CR Smith, Dunfermline, Fife
• While the £250m assisted deposit scheme for first-time buyers is a positive step, the question has to be asked who will benefit in the longer term as the cost of living increases along with unemployment. More than 15% of people in the UK believe they will be made redundant in the next 12 months. How many of these will be first-time buyers who are then left with debt or no home?
We must make sure that these homes are truly affordable for first-time buyers and that construction takes places in communities in need of regeneration, and not simply built with profit in mind. As a housing association we have proud history of working with communities to regenerate areas that aren't considered desirable by others. To provide affordable housing where it matters the construction industry and social housing sector must work together. Only then can we shape communities people not only want to live in, but also can afford.
Dr Chris Handy
Chief executive, Accord Group, West Bromwich
• You report on the establishment of a low-tax enterprise zone for the Tees Valley (Town battered by Thatcherism looks to budget for way out of the wilderness, 23 March). We in the Tees Valley welcome anything that will improve the area's prospects without destroying its environmental health. However, at least three of its five boroughs are being forced to cut supported bus services. These cuts result from reduced government funding, not local authority malevolence.
If this government really wants "enterprise" to flourish, it must provide funding for all the Tees Valley boroughs, so that the impending bus cuts do not take place and new bus services, eg to Teesport, may begin at once.
Car ownership in this area is low. Once the buses stop, we non-car-owners will become social pariahs. Is that what living in a low-tax enterprise zone is about?
Peter Walker
Billingham, Teesside
• Considering that it gets its forecasts as wrong as any government, what is the point of the Office for Budget Responsibility? Apart being a scapegoat, of course.
Tom Morris
London