There's an excellent clip of Jeff Randall skewering Alistair Darling on Sky News recently. I have taken the trouble to transcribe it, as I want a copy laminated and pinned to the wall next to the front door in case any Labour Party activists come a-calling between now and the election.
As I see it, this is your 13-year economic record: unemployment is higher than when you came in; the pound is worth much less than when you came in; our gold reserves were sold off at rock-bottom prices; our cash savings yield almost nothing; the Stock Market is lower today than it was ten years ago; our private pension system has been taxed into ruin; we are running record budget deficits, worse than anywhere else; and our stock of debt is heading for more than one trillion pounds. Why on earth would anybody want to vote for more of that?
Darling looked most uncomfortable. I feel a bit sorry for the chap, because he wasn't Chancellor when most of the critical decisions were taken.
We know who was.
Labour activists: if you come round here canvassing, make sure your campaign leaflets are biodegradable and not marked "For External Use Only".
H/t: Guthrum
Had we been in the euro darling Darling could have blaimed the Greeks!
ReplyDeleteWell, it's more realistic than claiming that 'a big boy did it and ran away', which is the basis of GB's argument about the US markets.
ReplyDeleteSadly, there's still a whole raft of Labour apologists out there who seem to think that Darling has magically fixed it all, the recession's over and there's no need to pay any of our debts back.
ReplyDeleteThe message, for me, was encapsulated in PMQs this week. Question 1, to Gordon Brown: "Were you first aware the figures you gave at Chilcot were misleading before or after giving evidence?"
The answer (paraphrased): "I admitted they were misleading to the House and wrote to Chilcot. Defence spending increased under Labour, no military requests were denied and under the last Conservative government defence spending fell."
No actual answer to the question, a couple of dodgy, shouty claims and blame it all on Thatcher. Typical. Repeat for all other questions, even the ones batted to him gently by stooges in the Labour backbenches. The man has no integrity whatsoever: how the hell can there still be the slightest possibility of his being re-elected?
I read the political pages of CiF (the Guardian online) and despair of the utter ignorance of so many Labour supporters. I was looking forward to May, now I'm rather more nervous about it all...
Still, it would be interesting (in a masochistic way) to see Labour have to clean up their own economic disaster for once, rather than handing it over to the Tories to sort out.
Socialists - inevitably, they eventually run out of other people's money.
And now Labour have nosed ahead of the Tories in the polls on the issue of the economy. I have to say I thought Darling did a workmanlike job with the budget, a least in its presentation. He seemed to 'get it', and we will need to make some tough economies before things will improve, whereas Brown is in full 'la-la-la can't hear you' mode over this. He may, to the utter despair of Balls, be the man who swings the election for Labour.
ReplyDeleteI'd like to see them face up to the full consequences of their profligacy by having to bend over and take it all for the next 5 years, but I think that would be the end of the UK I know. It would be East Germany in a smart suit and a lilac tie.