British Prime Minister Gordon Brown yesterday sought to reassure his party's traditional union allies over threatened public spending cuts before a general election.
But in a keynote speech to the Trades Union Congress on how to spur recovery from the global economic crisis, Mr Brown was to use the word "cuts" for the first time in admitting what needs to be done, according to the BBC.
Britain's unions, which provide the bulk of funding for Mr Brown's Labour Party, are nervous as the country's worst recession in years threatens to slash public spending on key services such as schools and hospitals.
Polls suggest that the main opposition Conservatives will defeat Labour in polls that have to be held by mid-2010.
As they head into the election campaign, Britain's two main parties must grapple with a ballooning budget deficit and soaring unemployment caused by the financial crisis.
"We have to make tough choices in public spending," Mr Brown was to tell union delegates in the port city of Liverpool, northwest England, according to pre-released extracts of his speech.
And hours ahead of the closely-watched speech, the BBC reported that Brown will admit that spending "cuts" are needed in some policy areas to address Britain's public finances.
The "c-word" as the media call it is politically sensitive because Brown has sought to paint opposition Conservatives as planning huge spending cuts, in contrast to the massive fiscal stimulus he has thrown at the crisis.
Mr Brown need not worry about unions abandoning Labour, after TUC leader Brendan Barber rounded on the Conservatives on Monday, saying that their plans to slash public spending would halt economic recovery.
Business Secretary Peter Mandelson meanwhile accused the Conservatives of wanting to make "deep cuts" to public services.
But Mandelson admitted in a speech in London on Monday that the centre-left Labour government would have to "prioritise and economise" to clear up the massive debt incurred in fighting the financial crisis. Barber, general secretary of the TUC, told its annual conference that unions remained supportive of Labour.
"I am so horrified when I hear the Conservatives talk of public expenditure cuts which would turn any progress towards economic recovery into a nosedive back into recession," Mr Barber told hundreds of delegates in Liverpool on Monday.
"We welcome the (Labour) government's active policies to stimulate the economy and support the hundreds of thousands of jobs that would otherwise have been lost," he added.