“UK is not in Greece’s situation but not far enough for comfort” – expert

A day after Britain's Prime Minister called a voter a bigot, the candidates of the three biggest parties will clash in the last TV debate before polling day. The focus will be on the economy.

According to the research director at the Taxpayers Alliance, Matthew Sinclair, no matter what party wins it will have to deal with Britain’s tough economic reality.

“We are not in Greece’s situation, but we are not nearly far enough from the Greece’s situation for comfort,” he said. “We borrowed more than any country except Greece and Ireland, one of which is going bankrupt, the other of which is making severe cuts. So, we have a very serious situation.”

According to the head of Demos’ Public Finance Programs, Sonia Sodha, it may be the case that the leading parties are not telling the complete truth about their future plans for tackling the crisis.

“We had an analysis published only a couple of days ago in the United Kingdom which showed that there is around 40 billion pounds of cuts which need to be made,” she said. “For spending, it has to be taken out from somewhere, or revenue that has to be raised through increased taxes. The parties are just not talking about it.”

“This is a very important issue for us. It means that people are going to the polls without actually knowing where the parties stand on how this money is going to be found,” Sodha added.

The election battle is in full swing in the United Kingdom, and has already been marred by a public scandal.

In a recent gaffe widely picked up by the British media, Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who is running for re-election, called a voter whose questions he had just answered a “bigoted woman.”

The premier’s words were caught on a broadcast microphone which was still attached and working when the politician was leaving the site in his car.

The woman challenged the premier on tax, immigration and asked him how he would pay back Britain's escalating national debt.