the 2010 uk general election was contested by a labour party and a conservative party which had both committed themselves to austerity policies. labour's then-chancellor of the exchequer alistair darling predicted that "two parliaments of pain" would be necessary to address the uk's budget deficit. the institute for fiscal studies said that labour's plans implied a cumulative decline of 11.9% in public spending over four years. this would reduce public expenditure by a total of £46 billion in inflation-adjusted terms, taking it from over 27% of the economy to below 21%, back to its level in the late-1990s. the ifs also said that there appeared to be only a modest difference between the plans put forward by the two main political parties. as predicted, neither party won a majority at that year's general election; resulting in the first hung parliament in 36 years, and the conservative party forming a coalition government with the centrist liberal democrats.