Harman: Cuts 'too far, too fast'

Party leaders will make a final push for votes today in the last day of campaigning for council elections in England and Wales.

Voters go to the polls on tomorrow to elect 27 county councils in England and seven unitary authorities, as well as Anglesey in Wales.

A by-election will also be held for the Westminster seat of South Shields, vacated by Labour's David Miliband.

More than 2,300 seats are up for grabs in council polls regarded as an important barometer of political opinion two years before the expected date of the next general election.

Interviewed on the Today programme Labour's deputy leader Harriet Harman confirmed that under the party's economic plans there would have to be a temporary rise in borrowing to fund a cut in VAT. In the long term, she said the measures would stimulate growth.

"We haven't been inconsistent in our messages... the government have cut too far and too fast" she explained.

And she added that the party "will review... [the] universality" of pensioners' benefits."

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4's Today programme on Wednesday 1 May 2013.