Balls lies

Billericay Dave

Balls was questioned on SKY this morning on Cameron saying brown was dishonest, all he could say was cameron was being a bully not a word about it being wrong, maybe one step to far to say hes not lying and then having to admit it later when the dark lord pulls the rug from under brown and balls goes for leader.

Patrick

Regarding the Sunday Times/ Dizzy quote: you can fool some of the people all of the time. Brown has been reduced to focusing on those people. Perhaps it is the only tactic to avoid Labour wipeout next year.

Andrew Cadman

So in others its OK to spread bitterness and division, as long as you win no matter what the moral cost.

Brown and Balls are disgusting individuals.

R

Balls was extraordinary. The interviewer (Sarah Montague I think?) tried initially to rein him in but then gave up and let him repeat his claims over and over again: feeble.

In addition to the lies you point out, he also repeatedly said that the Conservatives would lower spending on education in order to reduce inheritance tax, but the inheritance tax proposal was to be funded by changes in tax on non-doms, and anyway Labour copied it!

I seriously think that the Tories should just go for it. Put up billboards saying ‘Labour Lies’ and identifying specific lies, with the name of the liar and the time and place they were made and a refutation, and let the accused sue if they don’t like it. Yes the tone of political debate would sink, but it is the Labour party who are responsible because of their contempt for the truth.

Stuart Pearce

ONS: UK Q1 2009 GDP -2.4%

http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=192

that's Darling's forecast for fall in GDP for whole of 2009 taken care of in first quarter alone then. Happy days!

john miller

I'm off to a swearblog - back later.

Patrick

They're taking a massive gamble with this strategy. The newspapers are already savaging the lies - but not yet the TV stations. TV news is what moves polls and opinions much more than print. If and when the TV news goes for them I think it will all be over for Labour sooner than expected.

For those in the media (such as yourself Fraser) who wish to influence things I would recommend a huge behind the scenes campaign to influence your colleagues at the BBC, SKY, ITN and C4 to report the lies properly.

Mark C

Every time Brown or Balls is interviewed, the interviewer should start by saying: "We all know that you want to say that the choice is between Labour investment made possible by the government's actions and Tory cuts of 10% to pay for tax cuts for the top 3,000 estates. So we will take that as read. There is no need to repeat it. You and your colleagues have said it many times and our viewers/listeners know that that is what you want to say. I will now ask you some questions to which it is not the answer."

Alex

Balls might have it right. You make the valid point that the internet provides the time and space to scrutinse his claims, but who reads blogs? A small section of the population who already know who they are going to vote for.

Read the BBC's coverage of Balls' interview on Sunday (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8122915.stm). It's classic BBC "balance" - one side says one thing, another says the opposite. Balls is able to get the "tory cut" narrative out there. At best he get a score draw in terms of the write up.

Wily Trout

On the other hand, the DCSF has gone very quiet - it usually puts out about 3 press releases a day. But we haven't had anything saying which bits will be cut to fund the 30,000 homes. I bet we'll learn that Building Schools for the Future gets delayed by a decade, again.

Josh

Well, Evan Davis wouldn't let him get away with it because Evan Davies actually has an economics degree and knows what he is talking about. Also, Evan Davies, I suspect, may be a closet Thatcherite, as he wrote a book saying we should privatise public services to increase efficiency. I agree with every word.

Paul Huxley

If only Brown and Balls were as economical with the country's finances as they are with the truth.

The Professor

Whilst you're all on the point of telling lies, why don't you visit The Ministry of Truth. We are trying to make it illegal for MPs to deceive us.
www.ministry-of-truth.net

We'd appreciate your comments.

Steve.W

The Sunday Times/Dizzy quote about getting voters to hate the Tories suggests to me that the upcoming by-election in Norwich North is going to be essential reading. Crewe and Nantwich was just a warm up act, here's the real thing.

Cottage Pie

Fraser. Here's another Brown porky from PMQs a few weeks ago.You might be able to trace the exact words used. Cameron stated that the recession had started in April 2008 and Brown was quick to accuse him of getting his facts wrong, saying that the recession did not start until July 08. Well this morning the official figures show that Brown was lying through his teeth. GDP fell by 0.1% in quarter 2 (April to June)2008 and has been falling every quarter since then, (by a whopping 9.6% on an annualised basis in the latest quarter) - Dave - Make sure you remind Gordon about this one at PMQs tomorrow.

Simon Stephenson

"Balls is lucky Evan Davis wasn’t the one interviewing him this morning or he’d be sent out of the studio for lying."

Lucky? I think not. Balls wouldn't have condescended to go on the programme unless he was guaranteed a patsy interviewer. At least give him the credit for knowing how to protect dodgy propaganda.

[Balls said] "We have acted in the downturn, that will mean that the economy is stronger, we’ll have less unemployment, less debt"

He'll deny this is a lie. He'll say that he was making a comparison between Labour and the Conservatives. That relatively there would be less debt under Labour. And who can prove him wrong?

It's not as though this type of verbal gymnastics are anything recent. They're "New" Labour's hallmark. For far too long interviewers have let themselves be manipulated, chiefly because, I suspect, it's too much of an arse-ache to prepare adequately enough to be able to anticipate it. Sure, people like Paxman and Humphrys start from the premise that they're going to be lied to, but they don't think enough moves ahead to have anticipated the lie, and worked out a biting, and apparently off-the-cuff counter to it.

Was it Churchill who said "all the best off-the-cuff remarks are prepared days beforehand"?

The Cat with the Hat

The country has now been in recession for over a year. Cameron mustn't let Brown try to rewrite history as he always does.He should ask Brown at PMQs tomorrow to confirm that the country has been in recession for well over a year.

TrevorsDen

They lie because there is a convention that assumes people do not lie. So they think they can get away with it.

They lie because the media interviewers are basically thick - and that includes you too Paxman if you are reading this - who are incapable of the questions which would expose the lies.

They lie because thy are desperate. Telling the truth is unpalatable so they tell lies.

On the day Balls says they have acted to make the economy stronger (!) the ONS revises growth figures downwards.

strapworld

From the vast knowledge of fellow coffee housers out there. Is there any possibility of a civil action against Brown for:- MALFEASANCE
the performance by a public official of an act that is legally unjustified, harmful, or contrary to law; wrongdoing (used esp. of an act in violation of a public trust).

The public trust being him as Prime Minister in whom we the public place our trust.

drakes drum

Perhaps Billboards in the North should show a photograph of BROWN
the quote "We don't want or need them to understand the nuance of the argument. We just want them to hate the Tories again.”

HE THINKS NORTHENERS ARE THICK.

Conservatives certainly do not. We know you can spot a LIAR a mile off!

JONNY

I only hope and trust that Balls has one of his hooded eyeballs fixed on what's going on in the gilt-edged market.
As foreign investors unload more and more of this thrilling and incredibly safe stock.

Because if he doesn't, he'll find himself careering swiftly downwards as the whole bleeding floor gives way beneath him.

disgusted

Commentators should ask Brown about the 13.5% Labour cuts needed if Health, Overseas aid, and Education spending is to be preserved.

Ref: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6591122.ece

Jonathan Cook

I have to agree with comments on here. People who take an interest in politics know when Brown and Balls lie.

The lie only becomes real when TV news reports the deception as a lie.

Maybe a BBC journalist could do the country a favour and highlight that the "Government are sexing up the countries financial health"...............

Bentos

Alex is correct; regrettably too few people read these blogs and it seems always to be the same small group of individuals (including very occasionally myself)that take the time to post a comment.

The key is how to get Fraser's analysis out to the public in simple, yet irrefutable terms, such that they can see Labour's lies as precisely that.

Cameron should surely wield Fraser's graphs & tables and wave them under Brown's nose at PMQs - or even the Red Book itself, opened at the relevant page, and then challenge him to deny the truth.

boulay

balls lies

bears sh*t in woods

pope is a catholic

Irene

grrr.. I am so angry, Balls on Sky earlier saying the Conservatives were going to cut this, that and God knows what else - I really think every time one of them says something like this they should be held accountable- DC or someone should really retaliate every time, saying something like "more lies to add to the ever growing list" (because they are not being challenged when interviewed) or at least explain why it is lies, because it seems to be happening on a daily basis, and they are getting away with it.
The media coaching is very apparent with Balls & Cooper. notice every time they are interviewed they always use the interviewers first name in a very chummy way, classic!

Scooby Doo

Brown, Balls & Mandelson are traitors to UK plc. I despise these men.

James

It is now time for the Tories in general and Cameron in particular, to go nuclear. Call Brown a liar, at the despatch box if that is what it takes. The TV stations wiil have to cover it (even the BBC) and Brown will have to defend his lies. Go for it Dave, the country is crying out for this lunatic PM to have his bluff called.

David Logan

The interview on the Today programme this morning was a disgrace. What I think he actually said was that his department's budget was to be cut by £200M to pay for social housing. Sarah was pathetic and the BBC really have to be more vigorous about this. Politicians have always been selective in their stats and optimistic in their scenarios but this simple repetitive lying is a new low and needs stamped upon.
By the way do you notice that the BBC not only cut Cameron's superb speech from the news last night but also don't even have it on their website where you can hear Brown again if you want to. I am not a conspiracy theorist by nature but I am getting seriously fed up of the BBC.

Dave B

I thought Brown/Labour's problem was that people assume he's talking tosh, and so no longer listen?

Harry J

Cottage Pie
June 30th, 2009 11:02am

Fraser. Here's another Brown porky from PMQs a few weeks ago.You might be able to trace the exact words used. Cameron stated that the recession had started in April 2008 and Brown was quick to accuse him of getting his facts wrong, saying that the recession did not start until July 08. Well this morning the official figures show that Brown was lying through his teeth. GDP fell by 0.1% in quarter 2 (April to June)2008 and has been falling every quarter since then, (by a whopping 9.6% on an annualised basis in the latest quarter) - Dave - Make sure you remind Gordon about this one at PMQs tomorrow.
--------------

I think a recession is officially when there are successive quarters of negative growth, so Brown will claim legitimately that officially the recession didn't start until the 2nd quarter...

CW

While voters are not stupid, it is probably only 0.001 of the population who understand enough about public spending to understand the conflicting claims and arguments always shrouded in jargon.

The big nonsense is surely that it is possible or even sensible to spend your way out of debt. Everyone understands that that is a ludicrous proposition.

I think that would be a more fruitful line of attack.

Stephen Solley

I thought the Ed Balls interview this morning was staggering in its arrogance.
Balls just employed the age old Labour tactic of what ever you ask I am just going to talk all over you.

But even more amusing was Liam Byrne's interview on Newsnight last evening.
At one point all he could do was grin and blush as Jeremy Paxman pinned him down.

These are real clowns and it is astonishing that their own strategists don’t see it.

Wily Trout

Even Polly Toynbee says Gordon't lying now.

Minnie Ovens

Poor old Labour. Cannot get anything right.
They had nearly thirteen years to ruin the educational system and yet there are still a few who are coming out of it who are able to read and think.
But maybe the growing core of ignorant and stupid people is enough to stave off a defeat.
Have you seen the current slippage by the Conservative Party in their lead? Down to 11%.
Maybe it's not just a lack of any discernible conservative policies but the "I and S" brigade showing their northern obduracy.

The Bellman

And Liam Byrne is doing a pretty passable attempt at lying on Sky at the moment, saying that the Budget used the more 'pessimistic' predictions available. No concession that there's a yawning, echoing void where there should be at least the outline of a plan to reassure our long-suffering creditors that this binge will be repaid.

I'll give him this, though: he sounds calmer and more reasonable than Balls, with his swivelly eyes and lolling mouth - he always looks like he's just been caught masturbating by his grandmother. And of course his whole career is falling to pieces around him, so a few more lies on top of his disintegrating fantasy of endless growth will make virtually no difference.

By contrast, Byrne looks like an over-promoted provincial bank manager, but at least he knows he's only got to get through three minutes without blushing with the sheer mendacity of the effluent he's been told to spout. That gives him a degree of dignity.

Geoff Wyatt

In the first chart, the national debt numbers are actually billions, not millions ("£m") as shown.

Moraymint

Desparate. Bloody desparate.

This is now getting very scary. To think that we really are being governed by a small cohort of immoral political gangsters and shysters.

Isn't only supposed to be like this in bananas republics?

Biggestaspidistra

I think Sarah Montague did well this morning (and I have mixed feelings about the Today programme). She use 'dishonest' once and 'not honest' once. I thought she'd said 'con' but when I listened again it seemed more like 'problem'. My guess is it was Sarah's prodding that set Balls on a slow boil which finally exploded when he saw Fraser's piece, causing him to make that foolish phone call.

Ted Wooller

Joe Goebbels:
“If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State."

Ric

Do you know what would have great effect? If an interviewer simply refused to carry on. Tell Balls or Brown or whoever that they refuse to have their intelligence and that of their listeners insulted by someone insisting black is white. Just stop. Hang up. Move on to another story.

Simon Stephenson

Fraser

It's slightly off-topic for this post, but the Wall hasn't gone up yet, and I'm sure you won't mind.

Look at the restatement of the Q1 GDP decline just announced. Up from 1.9% to 2.4%. Bad news for the government?

Certainly if the figures are true. But if they're not, if somehow the government has managed to engineer the figures upwards unjustifiably, then they will in effect have reduced the likelihood of bad news in the future, having created a whopping great fictitious and reversable write-down in the less politically sensitive past.

But is the ONS, who produce the statistics, capable of being manipulated in this way?

Sophiehound

Ric - couldn't agree more. I was shouting at the radio for Sarah Montague to do exactly that, and shut him down. Complete waste of time, and infuriating that any platform is given over to such utter gobshitery.

Also very tired of the whole Inheritance Tax angle, especially (noted by R) as the very proposal was leapt on and stolen within minutes of its original announcement.

Whether DC et al need to step up (or down) and come out fighting, or they really are being sidelined by the media at large, is a moot point. Either way, please don't let them fall into the trap of vague, opaque sound bites. Tell it like it is, be fierce on Labour lies and allow some integrity back in.

Too much to hope for?

Heironymous Bosch

Proposal for DC: as an aid to restoring the fiscal balance, inheritance tax to be levied at 100% on the estates of all persons who sat in parliament since 1997 as Newlabour MPs and peers.

RM Dorset

I literally just flick the Tv off whenever Brown or Blinkie appear - I know it's going to be all lies so instead of listening I may as well do something useful - like watching some paint dry.

Pat Morgan

Liam Byrnes is "Mr Congeniality"

They always bring him out when they are desperate - someone who wouldn't sell his grandmother

ManicBeancounter

A few posts accept the need for interviewers to change tack, but accept it is not easy. Maybe they should ask "Is your lack of straight answers & constant attacks on the Tories because you are preparing for opposition?" Or "Is you lack of planning to sort out the deficit due to your knowing you will have less than 12 months in government?"