How to kill, rather than save, a premiership

Moraymint

Bring it on.

The result would be political catastrophe for the Labour Party, and perceived economic armageddon for the UK. The markets would have a field day considering the Brown/Balls track record of breathtaking economic incompetence.

At this rate, matters economic, political and, soon enough, social will soon be swirling into a hurricane of uncontrollable events, well before May/June 2010.

If Brown does indeed grab his Balls, the pressure on this utter travesty of a Government (as if the pressure wasn't great enough already) would become unbearable, even for the battalion of indestructible Orcs that is now Brown and his moronic acolytes.

The way things are going in politics at the moment, I'm frequently left either speechless or stunned or both at the growing carnage that is now characterising life in Westminster.

Somebody really had better get a grip of this unbelievable mess, and soon.

THX1138

When I read this the morning lying in bed with Mrs THX I nearly chocked on my Waitrose organic fair trade coffee.

Mrs THX assured me that the ST were just having a bit of a laugh I do hope she's right!

Nick

If Balls is as intelligent as the Spectator has always said (Fraser Nelson passim) why does he want to so closely align his (rapidly shortening) political career with that of Brown.

What possible benefit can it be for Balls to be Chancellor for a few months before the most catastrophic Labour defeat for over a generation ?

Surely he'd be better placed to keep his head down in his current position and hope to benefit as one of the "big beast" survivors from the 2010 meltdown ?

Major Plonquer

For months the press accused Brown of having no balls. Now that he has the press are accusing him of having Balls. Which is it to be?

Mark C

Mandelson for the foreign office and Balls for the treasury. That way at least they will fulfill their respective ambitions. They and Brown know that this is their last chance.

AndyLeeds

Well Guido calls him 'Jonah' Brown, and for good reason. I doubt very much that the public will buy into this 'cuts v investment' crap which they have now started to see through anyway. So it wont make much difference, except it could tear the Labour Party apart and I'm all for that !!

wonderfulforhisage

Wasn't Geoffrey Howe a Chancellor scorned. Remember his Commons leaving 'do'? I bet Maggie does.

chris

Bring it on. At least Darling is seen as a decent man (expenses claims notwithstanding).

Balls is bound to make a mess of it.

Bluebottle

To what question can Balls as Chancellor possibly be the answer?

He is Gareth Keenan to Brown's David Brent.

PalacePotter

Hmmm. Didn't John Major become the anoited one who was moved to the Treasury. Soon, thereafter, his was propelled to Number 10. Is history about to repeat itself.

The Laughing Cavalier

This is the man that journalists keep writing us as "clever" yet he presides over one fiasco after another, the worst of them being the tripartite "regulation" of the banks. He is a rotten performer in public, a trougher par excellence and unpopular with both his party and the general the public. He must have an ego the size of a house if he ignores all this and puts himself forward for such high office, not to mention the intelligence of a moron if he cannot see it.

Mitch

Surely a joke?? Balls is the most useless waste of skin I can think of.
If ed balls is the answer then the question is very wrong.

someone said gordon was a clever man this is proof of the reverse.

kinglear

I misread the red bit and thought it said "Gordon Brown wants balls as chancellor" I was going to say he conspicuously lacked and lacks them, but then I re-read it and saw it was Ed Balls.
They are both completely delusional

Alison C

See the force of the public comments under the Times article on this. Rather telling.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics
/article6396042.ece

johnny come lately

Brown and Balls. Sounds like a end of pier variety act from the fifties.

"Ello ello ello who is that little boy with you?"

"That is no little boy, that is my wife"

Cannot wait. This pairing will bring the general election forward by months.

Tiberius

No sweat.

Mervyn King has already had a private audience with the Queen and will be flexing his muscles to torpedo the Good Ship Balls when the occasion warrants it.

john miller

No, I think this is Brown's weakness becoming all too apparent.

Balls wants the job and he is the "top-level leak" trying to force Brown's hand.

Only Balls would describe himself as "top level", his preening vanity showing through even his leaks.

Sadly for Balls, the only extent of the reshuffle will be the voluntary sinking of the lamentable Smith.

Brown is now adrift on the seas of fate, unable to influence his destiny except by political suicide.

His only hope is for a Beverly Hillbillies moment and to strike oil in Downing Street.

Nicholas

The ocularly-challenged, Dalriadan idiot continues to conflate party politics with running the country. This is "government by campaigning against the Tories". Instead of recognising what the British people detest about him and his crap government and putting it right by calling a General Election he seeks to perform more cheap conjuring tricks contrived to deceive the people and prolongue his personal survival.

But this rubbish magician still manages to set himself on fire and kill his assistants whilst we watch the whole horrible mess, aghast that the Norman Wisdom of British politics will Carry On Regardless.

Moraymint

Just another thought about this Balls fellow.

How come there has been so little information and/or interest in his expenses' situation? Is it too quiet by half, or has he done "something" to gag the press? Or, indeed, is Balls as pure as the driven snow? Can anyone explain please, or even hint at what's going on here?

Simon Stephenson

It's a terrible thought, but I have to wonder whether Brown has abandoned his life-goal of Socialist utopia by the gradual, progressive removal of the ability of individuals to exist without dependence on the State.

It seems to me that he may have realised that he's not going to be given enough time to achieve this in a stealthy, gradualist way, and that he has fallen back on a position where he will spend his last 12 months in office putting in place measures that will make it as difficult as possible for his successor to re-establish a society that embraces individual freedoms.

Perhaps it's not incompetence or dogma that is behind the policies that so many see as being the very opposite of what is required. Maybe the trashing of society and the economy is actually a quite deliberate attempt to sabotage in advance, in the hope that the near-future will be so bad that Labour will once again be preferred at the polls. Thus allowing the next closet Communist to recommence the good work.

Oliver Cromwell

What Balls - the one who knifed the staff in Adult Social Care and in a Staff hospital because he argued they couldn't use the defence that it was the systems fault!

But who now wishes to blame the system and take no responsibility!

DM

If Brown wants Ball for chancellor, then why doesn't he do something about it? After all he is the PM...who the hell is stopping him? Does he have to run it all past us before he decides, or is he thinking about seeing what a(nother) tax payer review would say. For God's sake, make a decision.

Daniel

Perhaps Brown wants Balls in number 11 since there's no balls in number 10.

The Huntsman

Having this oaf as Chancellor is worth an immediate extra 5% off Labour's poll ratings and loads more as he proceeds to conduct a scorched earth policy on what is left of the UK economy.

I see the ST opines that Balls is 'well-respected' in the City. 'Well respected' for what? The mind boggles.

These city types are evidently a whole lot stupider than we thought when they trashed the UK banking system.

Whilst he will do immense damage to the UK in the eleven months left to this charade of a government, it may be that he will be the principal contributor to Labour having less than 50 seats at the next GE, in which case he may be a price worth paying....

Michael Booth

Guido's comment, that The Prime Mentalist should make Balls Chancellor because, after all, Caligula made his favourite horse a senator made me chuckle...

anne allan

Is Balls shoving aside his boss? Is it part of GB's scorched earth policy? Will we have Balls'n'Cooper as a grisly re-incarnation of that well known monarch William'n'Mary? Is GB, like Breznev in 1970's Russia, a stuffed corpse wheeled out for public display? Is GB going mad? Are the Cabinet going mad? Is Margaret Becket about to torch her caravan?
Hard to believe we're discussing the Government of one of the oldest democracies, let alone a country that within living memory had an empire that encircled the globe.
Hang your heads, all ye who voted Labour.
This is the third time in my lifetime that you've fouled up Great Britain.

Nick

It's fair to say that Balls was well-respected in the City but that was ten years ago. He had worked for a few years for the FT and could speak to City types in their own language. He also seemed very pro-markets and wished to maintain the status quo (including staying out of the euro).

His track record since then however has been dire and I doubt you'd find many in the City who'd welcome his promotion to Chancellor. Ironically, this comes at a time when Darling's stock is on the rise as he seems more confident in standing up to Brown's scorched earth mentality.

Tim Carpenter (LPUK)

What Simon Stephenson says.

Unfortunately, Cameron's "localistation" agenda will carry on the Fabian Fifth Column goals of the dismemberment of Britain, handing it over to the EU in nice digestible chunks.

Flemingcrag

I reckon Gordon will be playing a "blinder" if he moves Ed (so what) Balls into the Chancellor of the Exchequer role.
How devious this man is, surely its a stroke of genius when your poll ratings have never been lower to thrust someone liked even less than yourself by Country and Party alike into the limelight.
The awful memories of this man when previously employed in the Treasury as a "special adviser" will come back into the public mind. The almost total loss of peoples' private pensions, the downgrading of Company pension rights from final salary link to annuity purchase, the setting up of that useless quango the FSA, etc, etc... all the work of this know nothing mouthpiece.
I give Ball (have reduced him to one as he couldn't count to two) a month as Chancellor and he will replace Gordon as public enemy number 1.

Sally Chatterjee

This is another media stunt by Brown. He'll be faced with sadistic headlines and the only way to reclaim the agenda is to appoint the unpopular Balls and sack Darling.

Following the elections, Brown will "promise to listen" but the appointment of the unpopular, technocratic, double-claimer Balls will be proof of deafness.

anne allan

How come a system of powerful local government is reckoned to break up Great Britain but is a source of strength to the United States of America?

John Emsley

So Mr and Mrs Balls run the Treasury. This must be an historic first-a pillow talk Budget.......
Can all this get any worse?