Chancellor of the Exchequer John Healey defended his first budget against criticism that it lacked ambition, while warning Britain would face “hard decisions” about its spending priorities in the years ahead.

“I’d fundamentally contest that this is not a significant budget,” Healey said in an interview with Bloomberg Television. “There are some big decisions in this budget,” he added, citing announcements on future defense spending, housing and energy reforms. “In my view, you can’t just measure a budget on the scale of the scorecard.”The measures announced on Wednesday will bring in £6.6 billion ($8.8 billion) in additional revenue by fiscal year 2030-31, and a relatively modest £1.6 billion in extra spending, according to estimates by the Office for Budget Responsibility.

“There is no way that government can completely relieve the cost of living pressures or remove the pressure on energy prices,” Healey said. Measures announced by the chancellor in Wednesday’s statement offer around £150 of support to millions of households, while energy bills are forecast to rise by about £400 this winter.

After delivering his budget, Healey addressed businesses at Bloomberg’s London headquarters and told them he’d asked the Bank of England to look at the UK’s capital requirements regime to make sure it is “internationally competitive,” amid industry concerns that new rules place UK banks at a disadvantage to international peers.

He also insisted his tax raid on the sector would be temporary. Healey’s budget doubled the UK’s bank tax surcharge to 6% to help cover cost-of-living relief for cash-strapped households affected by the US-Iran war.

In the interview, the chancellor signaled that colleagues would need to prepare to make significant departmental spending cuts in order to pay for the government’s priorities, which include increasing its outlay on defense to 3% of domestic output by 2030 at the spending review next year.

“The spending review will be framed by the priorities that we set out in the 10-year plan for Britain,” he said, referring to a policy agenda Prime Minister Andy Burnham has said he’ll set out in December.

Healey said there would be “hard decisions about the top priorities for Britain in the years to come,” and “judgments that then follow about how we fund them.”Healey’s modest budget enjoyed a muted market response by prioritizing fiscal discipline, but left businesses lamenting a lack of policies to support companies, while campaign groups aligned to the governing Labour Party called for greater ambition.

The chancellor accepted that industry groups wanted more: “There are things that they really like and support. There are things that they wanted us to go further,” he said.

Asked whether his plans for sharp fiscal consolidation in the coming years were realistic, Healey replied: “Let the economists take their judgments.”He said his plans were endorsed by the International Monetary Fund, which has praised the UK’s fiscal restraint, and that he would “put Britain’s finances, its spending and its fiscal balances under control.”