XSLT: Padding text output to the right width

Padding Content

<!-- this is the function for making a field the right width --> 

<xsl:template name="leftjustify"> 

<xsl:param name="content"/>
  <xsl:param name="width"/>
  <xsl:choose>
  <xsl:when test="string-length($content) &gt; $width">
          <xsl:value-of select="substring($content,1,$width)"/>
  </xsl:when>
 <xsl:otherwise>
          <xsl:value-of select="$content"/>
  <xsl:call-template name="spaces">
       <xsl:with-param name="length">

                  <xsl:value-of select="$width - string-length($content)"/>

        </xsl:with-param>
   </xsl:call-template>
   </xsl:otherwise>
 </xsl:choose>
 </xsl:template>
 <xsl:template name="spaces">
  <xsl:param name="length"/>
  <!-- the value of this next variable is 255 spaces.. -->
  <xsl:variable name="longstringofspaces"><xsl:text>                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               </xsl:text></xsl:variable>
  <xsl:value-of select="substring($longstringofspaces,1,$length)"/>
</xsl:template>