Today Chancellor George Osborne will announce the biggest set of government cuts this century. In an urge to create a smaller state and cut the deficit, the Chancellor is expected to announce sweeping public sector reform that will hit all areas of society. Preston, whose number one employer is the University of Central Lancashire followed by BAE, is set to be hit hard by the cuts.

Today we’ll be providing you with up to date information and footage as the extent of the cuts unfold. We’ll be pulling in tweets, audio interviews, video packages and written reports right here on the live blog. We’ll be running reader polls and questionnaires as well as appealing to you the community to tell us how the cuts will affect you.

If you want to get involved you can tweet us @blogpreston, or simply comment on the live blog below. The national Twitter hashtag will be #csr, but we’ll also be using the more localised #prestoncuts to keep you abreast of everything, including live blogging the Chancellor’s speech.

That’s all for now, if you want to get in touch with us by email now you can do by emailing joseph@blogpreston.co.uk. We’ll see you back here around lunchtime tomorrow.