Households are promised help

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Officials were quoted by both the Sunday Telegraph and Sunday Mirror suggesting that VAT could be slashed from 17.5% to 15% for at least a year.

The £12.5 billion move was emerging as a possible centrepiece of Monday's Pre-Budget Report (PBR) as Gordon Brown and Alistair Darling signalled they were "ready to help".

The Government is expected to pump between £15 and £20 billion into the economy in a Keynesian-style bid to spend Britain out of the downturn.

"Every household will get support now - to help them through the difficult period ahead," Mr Darling wrote in the Sunday Mirror. "Worried mortgage holders will get help and I shall do what I can to help those who lose their jobs. And I will state exactly how we intend to pay for the help we are providing now."

The PBR comes amid growing concerns about Britain's ballooning debt and the tax rises and spending cuts that may be necessary later.

Tory leader David Cameron has come out against the Government's proposed "fiscal stimulus" - higher spending funded by borrowing to spur the economy back to strength.

But the Prime Minister attacked the Conservative "do nothing" approach, warning that failure to intervene only prolongs the pain of recession.

"If we do not act now, the downturn will be longer and more severe," he wrote in the News of the World. "A prolonged recession means people out of work for longer, more repossessions, and businesses taking longer to start growing again.

"We all remember what happened in the 1980s and 1990s when the Conservative Government sat on its hands and just let people fend for themselves. It took us years to recover and much of the damage could have been avoided had the Government stepped in to help people out. We will not repeat those mistakes. I want every household facing difficulty at this time to know we are ready to help and on their side."