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Britain’s national debt is now over £700 billion, the highest level in more than 30 years In 1979, net national debt was 49.1% of GDP according to figures produced from the Office for National Statistics at the end of 2008. The UK’s net debt reached £697.5 billion last December, equivalent to 47.5% of our GDP. In the Chancellor’s autumn statement of 2008, he predicted that national debt will increase to £1,000 million by 2012, and that by 2012–13 debt as a proportion of GDP will have risen to 57.4%. The UK currently comes eighteenth out of 28 countries in the Organization of Economic Co-operation and Development rich country league table, but if the Chancellor’s predictions are accurate, the UK will rise to fourth in the league table. National debt has spiraled since the recapitalization of the banking sector. Government borrowing in the last financial year was £71.2 billion, 92% higher than at the same point in the previous year when borrowing was £37 billion. In February 2009, the Office for National Statistics reported that it expected to have to add between £1 trillion and £1.5 trillion to the UK’s public sector net debt, taking the total national debt to an unprecedented £2.2 trillion – just under 150% of GDP. This would be the worst debt total since the 1950s, when Britain was in the process of paying back its war debts. ‘Spending will rise sharply over the coming months as unemployment surges, while the deep contraction in activity will continue to reduce tax revenues,’ said Andrew Goodwin, senior economic adviser to the Ernst & Young ITEM Club. ‘We expect the Chancellor to be forced to make significant upward revisions to his borrowing projections when he presents the Budget. ITEM expects Public Sector Net Borrowing to rise above £130bn in 2009/10.’