Britain's trend rate of economic growth, traditionally low by world standards, will be raised over the next decade in response to a range of reforms, Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer Mr Gordon Brown promised in a speech yesterday.

Mr Brown, in a speech to the Institute of Fiscal Studies, said Britain was now tackling the underlying causes of slow productivity growth and sowing the seeds for stronger economic growth.

"Some people argue that governments cannot affect the trend of growth rate of the British economy. I reject this pessimistic view. Our task as a government is to raise the sustainable trend rate of economic growth. That is our ambition and in the next decade we will achieve it in new ways," Mr Brown said.