September’s figures show Britain sinking deeper into debt.

Hours before George Osborne’s announcement of the massive spending cuts across the UK, figures revealed the UK borrowed over £16bn in September.

Although a rise of £0.7bn in comparison to the same month last year, it saw Britain’s net dept reach a total of £842.9bn. While the figure is still a decrease from September 2009, economists had predicted the amount to be lower.

IHS Global Insight Economist, Howard Archer said that although the increase in borrowing was disappointing, it was still a “modest” overall improvement for the financial year.

Archer also said: “The government will highlight this as a key reason to why there should be no delay in enacting measures to improve the public finances.”