What his most recent estimate of the UK budget deficit is; and what plans he has to reduce it.

I shall publish all my Budget forecasts next week.

The Chancellor will be aware that according to the European Commission's economic forecasts, there is to be a structural deficit of 2.8 per cent. for the United Kingdom, compared with western Europe's overall deficit of 1.1 per cent. On that basis, how will Britain be able to cope with an economic shock?

Actually, we are well placed to deal with current times of uncertainty. Debt levels are lower now than they were in the 1990s. Our interest rates are historically low and our economy is much more resilient than it was. Government borrowing was 7.8 per cent. of gross domestic product in 1993-94, whereas it was 2.3 per cent. in 2006-07. What would, of course, exacerbate the situation and make it extremely difficult for the UK would be to follow the hon. Gentleman's party's policies, as the Conservatives have in excess of £10 billion-worth of unfunded tax promises, not to mention other promises about prisons, the health service and even their green ISAs, where they had to admit that they had no idea how much those policies would cost.

What contribution to reducing the national debt will be made by the privatisation of the Tote, as that decision will mean a reduction in choice for punters and invariably that one of the three big bookmakers will buy it at below market price?

As my hon. Friend knows, the Government are considering the sale of the Tote. I am not sure that I would agree with him that its sale would necessarily result in a reduction in choice, but that is the Government's policy and it remains our policy.

Will the ceiling for the sustainable investment rule remain at 40 per cent. over the next economic cycle?

As I said to Andrew Rosindell a few moments ago, the fiscal rules that we set up 10 years ago have served this country well and enabled us to protect public investment, which Conservatives were unable to do in their 18 years in government. Those rules are important and it is also important to ensure that we maintain public investment and long-term sustainable finances.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies does not agree with the Chancellor's warm assessment of national debt levels. In fact, it recently concluded that it expects the sustainable investment rule to be broken. Given what he has just said about including Northern Rock and that having to react to that in national debt would be damaging to the economy, will he give the House a guarantee right now that the sustainable investment rule will not be broken?

As the hon. Lady knows, before any Budget or, indeed, any pre-Budget report, many commentators make forecasts. She, like the IFS and everyone else, will have to wait until next week to see what our forecasts are. What I can tell her—she ought to pay attention to this—is that under the Conservatives' latest economic policy of having a rule stating that there cannot be borrowing when the economy is growing above trend, they would have had to have cut something like 85 per cent. of capital investment over the last 10 years. To pursue that policy would be to repeat the very mistakes that the Conservative party made when it was last in office. We are not going to do that. We have rules that ensure that we can have long-term sustainable growth, which is one of the reasons why our economy is in much better shape now than it was in the 1980s and 1990s.