Chancellor George Osborne has unveiled the biggest UK spending cuts since World War II, with welfare, councils and police budgets all hit. The pension age will rise sooner than expected, some incapacity benefits will be time limited and other money clawed back through changes to tax credits and housing benefit. A new bank levy will also be brought in – with full details due on Thursday. But shadow chancellor Alan Johnson, for Labour, called the review a “reckless gamble with people’s livelihoods” which risked “stifling the fragile recovery” – a message echoed by the SNP, despite smaller than expected cuts in Scotland.