Cabinet to make choice cuts to save €440m in public purse

CUTS and compromises will be the main feature of the public finances over the next 18 months, the Government announced.

Civil service jobs will be lost, public contracts scaled back, pay frozen, quangos scrapped and decentralisation put on hold.

The measures, which are designed to make savings of €440 million in public spending this year and €1 billion in 2009, follow confirmation last week that tax revenues would be €3bn short of what was expected by the end of the year.