US house backs big spending cuts

The Republican-controlled US House of Representatives has adopted a dramatic 2012 budget plan that would cut the country’s debt by revamping the decades-old system that guarantees medical insurance for Americans over 65 and to the poor and disabled.

The plan put forward by Republican Representative Paul Ryan, the budget committee chairman, is at odds with a spending vision President Barack Obama outlined earlier this week which foresees tax increases for high-income Americans while holding the line on those major social contract programmes.