Brown pledges continued public spending

The government will stick to its public spending plans for the next three years, the prime minister has said.

Speaking to an audience of civil servants in Westminster on Tuesday, Gordon Brown said the global downturn would not lead to ministers abandoning public sector spending agreements.

Addressing the Civil Service Live event, he said that public services would have to be increasingly personalised to justify continued investment.

The British civil service was regarded around the world as a "premier brand", he said.

But, highlighting the threat to the UK economy from countries such as China and India, he said: "The race in the world is not a race to the bottom now, with countries competing on low pay, the race is a race to the top, and we have to compete on skills."

The public sector would become "not less important but more important", he went on.

While governments in past world economic downturns had been forced to cut public spending, he said, the "challenges of the future" required continuing investment.

"I think it's important that we say now that over these next three years, having set out public expenditure plans, we will not do what has happened on previous occasions, we will retain those public expenditure plans for the future."

In exchange, he said, the public sector would have to provide "more personalised" services from policing to welfare.

Government departments will have to communicate more with each other, and do more to consult, inform and involve the public, he said.

Brown also told civil servants that "we need more reform to ensure continued high standards" in public services.