TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber said: 'All across Europe governments have become obsessed with immediate deficit reduction and are embarking on cuts programmes of such magnitude that the fragile recovery of the continent's economies is threatened…if there was ever a case why severe cuts in spending are not the answer we need look no further than across the Irish Sea where the spectre of a double-dip recession is looming large, and where despite huge cuts in spending, Ireland faces another austerity budget, its fourth in two years.’