Talking Balls

Dan

Excellent work. Balls and his henchmen are a grotesque bunch of liars. It really is that simple. He must be the only guy as voter-repellent as Brown.

Talking of liars, the truly terrible Liam Byrne was at it on Newnight yesterday. He claimed that the Tories had promised to reverse the 50p tax hike and had made the inheritance tax change a priority. Both of which are out and out lies.

seb

You'd better damn well do what Reichsleiter Balls tells you! Is this not a Fuehrerbefehl, after all, direct from Der Bunker?

John W

Well done for standing your ground with these lying thugs.

Irene

Balls - I hope you are reading my post because you are a LIAR and the whole Government is - you may have got away with it in the last two Elections, with yet more lies, but not this time - things have moved on fortunately - the so called 'ordinary' people can see it now and as for wanting to be the next Labour Leader - forget it - you just can't perform I'm afraid. Maybe more media training required ?

WildBill

Keep up the good work! The fact he actually phoned you means he knows he has been rumbled good and proper.

Neil McEvoy

The truth hurts.

Steve Walker

Balls to Balls. It's a lie and he's a liar.

Greta Big Billygoat Gruff

Lie

The Bellman

Funny: you'd think the mad-eyed lickspittle would have better things to do than hassle journalists - like placing calls to reality TV 'stars' for his boss. Oh, and maybe running his own, highly dysfunctional department.

But he does look increasingly deranged. I was half-expecting you to say he had rung to tell you to go and kick a blind man on the Charing Cross Road, where you would learn something.

Anyway, now the blade is in, keep twisting. Don't worry if the blood feels a bit hot at first. And don't succumb to feelings of sympathy for the pair of shysters because they're looking exhausted as well as shifty. They need to be exposed mercilessly. There needs to be nothing they can salvage for posterity from the twisted wreckage of their economic incompetence.

Irene

Balls - Don't mess with Fraser!

kinglear

I am a great believer in telling people they are lying. In this unfortunate country of ours people take enormous offence if they are called liars. However, in my experience, it usually leads to them saying sorry when it is proven to them that they have been lying and making a correction.
This government, of course, doesn't.

J Hind

No wonder education standards are falling when he is more concerned with another more important Minister`s role than that of his own. He should get on with his own educational problems which dont need graphs to illustrate just how dire they are

Marcus Playfoot

Fraser, you are doing a fantastic job by exposing this government's lies. Balls has clearly told a lie and is furious about being found out. I voted for New Labour in 1997 and 2001 (and didn't vote in 2005). I will be voting Conservative at the next election because it is clear that we need a change - this government has become complacent, mendacious and deeply sinister and needs to go. GENERAL ELECTION NOW!

Craig Barrett

Go for it Fraser!

There appears to be barely a word that comes out of Balls' mouth that has even a hint of truth. This is a case in point. Carefully constructed semantics to try to wriggle out of a difficult position whilst simultaneously painting the Tories as evil.

But not carefully constructed enough.

Still, if Balls has enough time to read this site and 'phone you to complain, he clearly isn't spending enough time on his Cabinet Position. Perhaps he should make way for someone who might have a better go at it.

Publius

Mr Nelson. DO NOT allow yourself to be bullied by this lying creep.

Labour is trying to pretend there is no need for cuts. Labour is trying to pretend the insane spending-spree can continue unabated.

Labour, in short, is trying to deceive the public.

And so, Mr Balls, are you! You are consciously, deliberately, systematically, lying.

Lee Hannaford

He is a liar. I can call him that too as I am one of those pesky voters. If he would like to call me and tell me to withdraw my comment just pass my e-mail and I will more than happily listen.
The graph to me looks like debt is going up by the way. I have that ability, maths and reading, but then I did leave school in 1994.
Lucky me!!

Susan Hill

Then Balls is not only a liar but a thug and a bully.. and you have done what is absolutely the right thing, Fraser, which is not only expose the lies with cool hard facts but stand up to the bully. Absolutely typical New Labour behaviour.

fitaloon

If you lie long enough, often enough and against all the facts then the lie is the truth.
This is now how we are governed.

J R Hartley

So weak!!

He appears to have the same grasp of the web and blogging as the IN Berkley-educated Derek Draper.

Your pants are on fire Edward.

BugHunter

I do not understand government borrowing figures, but I do understand Balls - he's a lying toad. Keep up the good work and dont't let the bastards grind you down!

Tom Pride

Seems they don’t like it up ‘em. The Cabinet is clearly split between those prepared to follow the mendacious, deceitful, dishonest Brown with accusations of Tory 10% cuts and denials of Labour cuts to Departmental spending and those with sufficient moral character and conscience to decline to lie and hoodwink the public.

The latter include Liam Byrne, Hilary Benn, Alistair Darling and oddly Peter Mandelson. Notice how they use the euphemism “tough decisions” and when pushed wriggle around unwilling to lie. The less slippery end up admitting this means cuts to Departmental spending.

I suppose there is a third category, those lacking the intellect to understand. Is that what Brown, Balls, Hain, and Woodwood are going to claim when eventually pinned down and exposed?

JohnOfEnfield

PLEASE PLEASE PUT UP A POLL.

I applaud you for standing up to this so called minister who lies and lies and lies again.

Calming down only slightly - Blair & Brown & their followers have changed politics by their constant smearing of any opposition. It demeans them and us.

I also cannot comprehend how a government can look us in the eye when we will have TWO years of £200Bn + budget deficits. At least "Sunny Jim" had the courage to accept it was his fault and go - quickly.

I am DELIGHTED that you stood up to this ministerial prat (did HE lecture Cameron on his bullying tone recently?)& told him where to go.

None of us will be at all surprised that his telephone manners did not extend to giving you a polite "goodbye".

Fraser

Brilliant - Balls reads these posts. Edward you're a squinty liar.

tenpin

Balls also acused the Tories of using "bullying" tactics on Sky News this morning...he then when on to splurt out a party political broadcast - the deft news reporter E. Holmes did not give him a rough ride at all.

Plato-Says

Hilarious - nailed on.

Well done!

Paul

Well, well, well. So here is where we are at, and this is what Germany must have felt like as the Nazis were coming to power.

As you say, Fraser, in an earluir post, it seems that Liebour are relying on the media to be lazy, and not challenge their demented fantasies. And, as one could predict knowing their type, when someone does challenge them, they resort to intimidation. Pure evil.

Luckily, NuLab are a well and truly spent force. For the first time, I think I can say it with confidence. Who didn't just laugh at Brown's imaginative relaunch yesterday?

Keep up the good work - you are on the side of truth. Brown's covent of black-hearts is wicked, and they are liars.

Liz Brown

How on earth can we call an urgent General Election and get rid of this mendacious bunch
The brownballs and the apology of a human being, mandelbum, must be consigned to oblivion now
Please Fraser,continue to call them on each and every lie

mitch

Tell him where to get off. Who gives a toss what he thinks?

Since when did this lot deserve consideration?

Tiberius

My goodness, they're desperate.

Of course Balls is lying just as Brown keeps lying at PMQs about spending cuts.

My financial work has taught me that using doublespeak to try and reach the unreachable doesn't work. The problem with overpromoted political researchers is that they don't have a developed sense of proportion over these things.

Balls; you're off the radar and drifting further into the oblivion of outer space. But I suspect you do know that, just like you know you are responsible for wrecking the banking regulatory system.

Sasquatch

Lie: "a type of deception in the form of an untruthful statement, especially with the intention to deceive others"
Oxford English Dictionary defines a "lie" as "an intentionally false statement."

Ed Balls made a statement about debt falling. 1) As you've already pointed out, Balls wants to try and spin that he was referring to "debt ratio". The statement says otherwise ("debt will fall" - nothing about ratios or "of GDP", just "debt") and 2) there is no mention that the statement refers to projections, not substantiated facts, as his statement would have you believe.

On that basis, Ed Balls lied.

His only defence, would be to state that this is what he expects to happen under the new Tory Government.

Otherwise, it's a lie.

Raffles

Fraser, you must be doing something right.. Me thinks he doth protest too much. Lets hope he makes a big song and dance about it. Can only be good for the Speccie's circulation.

mac

An illuminating piece, Fraser, and well said throughout. Exposing the depth of their lying and openly calling it for what it is is clearly rattling Brown's desperate bunker gang.

It would be revealing to learn from any Treasury SPAD (if such creatures haven't completely given up, that is) what their master thinks of the egregious, loud-mouthed Balls pontificating completely outside his cabinet remit.

Your exchange confirms that McBride did no more than loyally transmit exactly the message desired by the BrownBalls combo, and confirms that his style mirrored his master's, too.

An illuminating piece, Fraser, and well said throughout. Exposing the depth of their lying and calling it what it is is clearly rattling Brown's bunker gang.

theARE

Ed Balls deceiving voters? Surly not. He'd surly never ever dream of such a thing.

Innocent little lamb like him with the nasty old Spectator bullying him

Just like that nasty Dave bullies his best friend Brown.

Ed, Gordon you and your bunch of corrupt thugs have been rumbled.

No one believes a word you say anymore - why? Because deceits and lies is all you ever deal in.

Election Now!

Anseo

He is a fibber of the highest order.

ken from glos

Stick to your guns, Balls is lying.In fact i am more than happy to call balls a liar to his face along with Brown and the rest of the corrupt crew. LIAR.

Andy

Start a poll.

tenpin

Why didn't Darling call you to discuss this???

Isn't Balls the Education minister?

If there is a poll I think you will find that Balls is a liar.

Tom Dexter

This government must think that everyone in the UK is as thick and unintelligent as themselves.

Dob

an issue of semantics. You couldn't make it up

G Adlam

No, its a lie. They think we are fools.

CJH

The best coffee house post! The last gasp of a government in terminal decline.

Sarah

I don't know what he's complaining about.

Newspaper editors have, because of the actions of this Government and many of its MPs, been given carte blanche to use words like 'lie', 'thief' and so on because this bunch wouldn't have a hope in hell of defending themselves in the libel courts.

The game's up.

les

Mr Balls, you may well read this.

Your government is bancrupt in gterms of moral authority and in my view cameron should have used the l word yesterday to describe what your government is doing.

In my view you must have been using the same moral compass as your master Brown which unfortunately broke down some time ago.

Its time for an election !!!

Simon Denis

First of all - well done, Mr Nelson. Secondly, I heard that interview and it was an outrageous affair. Balls hectored and jabbered and accused and all too easily evaded Miss Montague's feeble attempts to cross examine him. He might be proud of this - as an example of "political skill" or some such tripe. But it shows that he is all too representative of this despicable parliament of spivs and whether a stooge of Debt Mountain Brown or Warmonger Blair, he is not worthy of public office.

Tom

No it doesn't. You clearly have him rattled. Carry on.

councilhousetory

They don't like the lies being pointed out do they. Fink was obviously right when he said that Gordon and the bunker are stuck in 1994.

Havocman

So, did Mr Balls think he was going to achieve anything by demanding that the posting be removed? If he did, he is seriously deluded.

For what it's worth, in my opinion Fraser is right.

Imran

I think you're missing the point.

He was on the radio - what do you expect him to do? get into the kind of explanation you've just gone through here?

in the circumstances, i think he was entitled to summarise in a way that's helpful to his point. all politicians have to do that.

the accusation of lying i think is wrong and unfair. i think he's entitled to ask you to withdraw that part of what you say.

http://viva-freemania.blogspot.com/

"he is referring to a debt ratio, not debt, and they are two fundamentally different things"

The debt-to-GDP ratio is what matters in terms of our ability to pay it off.

If the USA had double our own national debt (in cash terms) then their situation wouldn't thus be twice as bad as ours - it would be much better, as their economy is over five times the size of ours. Barack Obama would be turning cartwheels in the street.

Governments don't have "special magic debt", but they do have near-total immunity to the kind of collapse in income that individuals suffer when becoming unemployed - and they also have potentially infinite lifespans in which to pay off debt.

Otherwise, you have some fair points. Balls was awful to listen to.

Nicholas McMahon Turner

Keep on spelling it out as the lies must be exposed fully to the public to force change for our childrens' sake. Care of our country is more important than any one party staying in power.

obangobang

I know it's a lie. I saw his lips move.

Border Reiver

The general election is going to be a pub fight - Motherwell Rules.

Chuck

Good God!! The man is a Minister of State. Doesn't he have better things to do that personally attempt to silence his critics? Is he so thinned skinned and insecure that he's worried about one critical blog exposing his lies?

JonathanB

What's so fascinating is his anger. Most people caught in an obvious lie would conceal, justify or excuse themselves. He responds with the outraged aggression of the wronged innocent.

Any psychotherapist (even Derek Draper) would diagnose this immediately as an advanced state of narcissism.

When the narcissist is confronted with information contrary to his worldview (Balls is a principled and widely esteemed politician) he experiences profound discomfort which he conceals from himself and from others under a mask of fury. The more you confront him, the angrier he gets. It's not that he doesn't want to see reality it's that it's emotionally too expensive for him to do so.

Narcissists also tend to form strong bonds with each other: "I won't confront you with objective reality if you do the same for me". Balls and Brown are absolute kindred spirits and the relationship is toxic - to them and to us.

Chris

This is clearly a case of lying. Mr Balls can sue me if he wants. There is a subtle difference between stating your case is the way most beneficial to yourself and lying. Unfortunately Brown and Balls are about as subtle as a hammer.

This compares Brown trying to say the tories would make 10% cuts AND that they would cut spending on health. One is related to the other but they seem to say anything at all which they think is what the voters want to hear.

I know that some on here are critical of Cameron for not being specific, but surely this pales in comparison to the outright deceptions of the last few weeks.

PS Somebody ring the fire brigade for Mr Balls - his pants are on fire.

Bardirect

Where's the poll?

Mike, Brighton

I'm sure Ed will be reading this so....
Ed - you and your government have two choices. Go down with honour and own up about the (as you put it) "difficult choices" we face...or go down with dishonour and lie about the state of the economy.
At the moment dishonour awaits.

glw

Well said Fraser, stick to your guns. You are right, whereas Balls, Brown, Mandelson, and Byrne are wrong. The public have sussed this, so have the press, don't let them off the hook.

Alex

Well done for exposing Balls' lies. It shows what a powerful readership you have!

There's a serious point here though. If people think the endemic lying in the government will end if Brown goes, they are mistaken. There are plenty of others in the Cabinet that will follow the same strategy.

By the way, as Mr Balls is reading this page, could someone rehash the details of his and his wife's troughing at the public expense? They rather got overshadowed by the duck house, so it'd be good to see them again - just as another reminder of why this man should never achieve his laughable ambition of becoming prime minister.

rmh

You should note all times they do this.....

chris

They're rattled, great work. The days when Brown and Balls could get away with their own self agrandessment is long gone. History will not lie on their incompetant economic policies. Like all bullies they don't like their own medicine!

Steve.W

Hello Mr Balls, or can I call you Ed? It seems that you, like me, read the Spectator online, so I assume you will reading this. I see you, again like me, give advice, "take that post down now".

Well Ed I'd say don't go on BBC Radio 4 and do that steam-roller-yappy style. It makes you sound shifty, not good eh?

Ian Walker

So in household budget terms, what Balls is saying is that it's OK to keep borrowing an extra hundred quid a month on my credit card, because my boss predicts that he'll be able to give me a payrise in a decade?

And that I can describe the above as "borrowing less"?

phil

It seems to me he is trying to set himself up for the inevitable tilt at the leadership that is coming sooner or later. It is all or nothing for him because reports suggest he lacks any sort of natural constituency in his own party. He needs to utilise every method he can now whilst his old ally is still in place.

The alternative is political oblivion. This explains his current almost daily tv appearances. As a school governor and parent i would rather he got on with the day job - education

Mr Eugenides

Excellent work, which will no doubt attract much attention across the blogosphere.

Yep, the difference is that ten years ago they'd have had to sustain the lie through a couple of tricky interviews, maybe a press conference, then they'd have been out the other side and clear. But now, we - rather, you - can keep harassing them until they confess to the truth or go down clinging to the wreckage of the lie. Great stuff.

Doug

Excellent work , Fraser . You are doing what the fourth estate should have been doing for years.PS Dont go walking in the woods.

Stewart

Excellent post, it shows how out of touch the left is with regards to the power of blogs and the internet as a whole. Witness the Guido Fawkes/McBride episode. However as you alude to in your post the broadcast media is still a very important place to get ones point across and to counter the lies told by opponents.

There are many internet based resources and some newspaper columns devoted to countering the lies spouted regularly by the global warming brigade however it is rare that these arguments are seen and heard on tv and radio. As a result we have to pay 5p for a shopping bag, can't find a parking space, swelter in public buildings in the summer because they won't install effective air conditioning etc... The Spectator is doing a great job in countering the Left's lies on the economic front but if the European elections showed us anything it is that the Greens are evolving into more than a mere protest vote in some areas. Unlike the BNP and UKIP they have not had their success scrutinised to such a large degree. Yet their lies and extreme policies would be as much a threat to individual liberty and the economy as those from Brown and Balls if they ever were in a position to implement them. I understand why the Conservatives are shying away from confronting the Green organisations and the left in general on their global warning fibs, some of the shadow cabinet may actually believe the fibs but the Spectator should in future do more to counter the now conventional wisdom on many aspects of the environmental debate.

Hamish

I think he's got a point. It's a more relevant way of looking at it, isn't it. I mean, isn't yours a sort of "money under the mattress" analysis. The relationship between GDP growth and debt is a bit more complex in my view than you seem to be suggesting.

Bring it on

Balls, are you just going to take this from Fraser Nelson ?

Aren't you going to have him arrested or something ?

Come on, be the fascist government you want to be.

bergen

To have produced such a reaction suggests that you have seriously rattled him-his response simply makes him look ridiculous.

He is clearly hoping that the Parliamentary convention of not calling people liars should apply to the media.So long as he continues to lie,he can expect to be called a liar.

kevin atkinson

He must have got you confused with the BBC

WheresMyVote

Brilliant - Ed "I've barely spoken to McBride" Balls is lying, everyone can see it.

Bullying and intimidation might have worked when they had control over the media outlets but not any longer.

Keep up the good work.

Pete, Scotland

I think there is more than just this one issue that has touches of Orwell's Animal Farm about this Government.

Orwell could have had New Labour in mind when he wrote it.

Anyway, I am in no doubt that Brown, Balls and co are lying in the firm belief that the mainstream media are either too timid, lazy or stupid to expose them in such terms.

UffusDuffus

“We have acted in the downturn, that will mean that the economy is stronger, we’ll have less unemployment, less debt…”

So, presumably less unemployment is a ratio too?

Dot Neck

When people in the real world talk about their debts they are always referring to the amount of money they owe - never the ratio of that amount versus their income.

Balls does not of course live in the real world but he at least knows this. To claim he was referring to the debt ratio is simply an attempt to cover up his transparent lie having been found out.

Given that he accused David Cameron earlier today of using "aggressive and bullying language" his attempts to get you to take the post down are hypocritical to say the least.

Peter

This series of Spectator posts could be one of those moments that historians will points to as opening another of the government's big veins, like some of Guido's have. Not a death blow, but another wound from which they government will be terribly weakened. Fraser having said it outright, maybe some of the invertebrates in the 'news' papers and fearlessy independent broadcast media will grow if not a spine, just some notochord would do, and start telling the truth about the may we are being misled.

RayD

Well, Mr. "when I use a word it means exactly what I want it to mean" Balls, if you're going to use "debt" as a shorthand for "debt as a proportion of GDP", what word would you like us to use when we mean debt? Investment?

Jonathan_T

More and more Nixonian.

Deep in the bunker it's not the lie that's the issue, it's the being exposed as a liar.

There was also the relatively recent Balls lie about 'hardly knowing McBride'. As (re)pointed out by Guido.

Will J

Balls's point is that he is not lying because he can produce a fact that could be construed in some highly tenuous sense as being referred to by what he said. If "lying" is limited to cases where there is no conceivable sense in which a person's statement could be true then Balls is probably right, he is not lying, since there is indeed a possible meaning to his words which resemble the truth.

But should we really accept this meaning of lying? Balls is clearly saying something in a way which is deliberately intended to convey untruth to his audience. Very few people would accept that this was not a lie simply because if his words were understood in a way which they do not suggest to his audience, and which moreover he did not intend them to mean to his audience, then they would be (kind of) true.

Darling's "plans" amount to little more than a claim that if the government were to curb its borrowing in the next few years (fat chance) and the economy recovers quickly (more quickly than anyone except the government is predicting) then at some point in many years time the rate of increase of debt will drop below the rate of economic growth so that in "real terms" there will be a de facto reduction of the debt. Balls, however, clearly intended by what he said to make people think that Darling has included in his concrete financial plans provisions to begin paying off the debt. He therefore lied.

I'd be intrigued to know on what facts Balls's belief in the Great Lie – about public spending rising – is supposedly based.

JR

Hilarious. Blinky Balls should really realise that even most of his former Treasury wonks think he's talking absolute rubbish 24/7.

H Taylor

You both sound pathetic and immature.

Exasperated

So is there nothing happening in the DCSF this morning that means the Minister can involve himself in matters of state for which he has no remit.

Perhaps Mr Balls has diarised 'Fix broken education system' and 'Sort out examinations fiascos' as tasks to do this afternoon.

Oscar

Brilliant work Fraser. You clearly have significant influence over Balls and he is obviously an avid reader of your posts. It was your 10 percent post about Tory cuts that set the whole 'Mr 10 percent' lie going, inaugurated by Balls after reading it. He was quite happy to twist and turn your argument for his own ends when it suited him. But when the spotlight is on his ridiculous maths and cover ups he calls foul. Typical bully. So bully boy Balls - if you're reading - liar, liar, pants on fire!

Gawain

Edward, we really do expect better standards from the Fourth Form. Telling lies like you did on the radio this morning reflects very badly on you and will seriously jeapordise your chances in the electoral examination you know you will face in the next year. Stop snivelling, pull your socks up and make sure you don't do it again.

Der Gruppenführer

Fraser Nelson, your name is now on ze list.

Alex

Okay - let's give it to Balls, he meant debt to GDP and everyone who is anyone knew exactly what he was talking about(indecently, doesn't that just tell you everything you need to know about Balls: he deliberately talks in a shorthand incomprehensible to anyone who is not an economist or working in politics).

But even this doesn’t stand up to scrutiny. Just yesterday his boss, the first sec of state etc etc Peter Mandelson, told the Today Programme that it wasn’t possible to publish a Comprehensive Spending Review until after election because we didn’t know how the economy was going to develop and it would be wrong to base public spending decisions on “speculative projections.” How then does Balls expect us to believe “speculative projections” for 10 years time? Especially when, as you say, the budget runs out in 2013/14 and there is no flesh thereafter. What is he going to cut and what extra is he going to tax? Economic growth won’t do it alone.

They can’t have it both ways.

p.s. debt in real terms will, of course, still be growing in 2017/18

Trevor

The most shameful aspect of all this is that they are primarily setting out to con their core voters.

The people who rely most on the state to look after them. The people who will find that the services that they depend on will no longer be affordable by the nation. The people whose children and grandchildren will be paying much higher taxes for the reduced state provision, if only they knew it.

People such as Ed Balls who trade these lies to the most vulnerable are beneath contempt.

JGS

Bravo!

Joe Mooney

Your point about the web is a very valued one.

Old Balls would have got away with telling porkies a few years ago but thanks to people like you he has now nowhere to hide. I am sure like me that Guido and Mr Dale will be pleased with your good work.

As Guido oftens reminds us the people should not be afraid of the Government the Government should be afraid of the people.

Well done Fraser. Keep up the good work.

Gary Williams

It's simple. Forget this proxy war in the media, and the pantomime of PMQs.
Cameron should challenge Brown to appear with him on Newsnight, or with Marr, and argue this specific issue with real numbers, under a moderator who will not allow either man to weasel out of answering direct questions or making his numbers add up.
Let him just challenge Brown to have that debate. When Brown inevitably ducks it, the Tories (and everyone else) can make the point again and again that Brown was challenged to defend his numbers and could not do so.

Marc Oliver

Very well done for standing up to Fuhrer Brown's shoeshine boy.
Brown and Balls are not just straining credulity, they are dismembering it!

eeyore

This whole Govt hides behind the rule that the word "liar" is unparliamentary. They should remember that the word may be banned but the meaning isn't. I offer, for what it's worth, a phrase used about one of my ancestors, whose job was to handle the bribery in the Irish Parliament in the late 1700s: "His veracity," they said, "was conditioned."

McGroom

UK public sector net debt is £791 billion (see http://www.statistics.gov.uk/imf). With 29.1 million people employed and paying tax, that is £27,182 of government debt for every worker.

As of the end of last year, UK gross external debt was £6.4 trillion. External debt (or foreign debt) is that part of the total debt in a country that is owed to creditors outside the country. The debtors can be the government, corporations or private households. The debt includes money owed to private commercial banks, other governments, or international financial institutions such as the IMF and World Bank.

That means UK corporations and government have liabilities to the rest of the world of £220,000 for every UK worker, showing the perilous state of corporate finances. This explains why the banks are not lending despite being flooded with government cheap cash. Have you noticed that investment banks writing equity research on UK banks fail to make any mention their debt levels in their recommendations for fear of revealing the emperor has no clothes.

If global investors have a crisis of confidence with the Bank of England’s inability to service its debt (especially as Darling has the printing presses on), Sterling will drop through the floor. The UK cannot possibly hope to find £6.4 trillion to meet external liabilities if confidence fails and Norman Lamont’s problem will seem tiny in comparison.

With OECD predicting that UK unemployment will reach 3 million (10%) over the next year, where does Brown think the tax revenue will come from to fund his spending.

New Labour (Blair, Brown, Balls and Mandelson) seem intent on destroying this country by devolution to Edinburgh, Cardiff, Belfast and Brussels, creating debt so huge to undermine the fabric of the country and destroying the only world beating industry that generates the lion’s share of our tax revenues.

James

If he thinks you have defamed him, he can always seek redress in court.

GoldenAxe

Fraser:

Another deception for you - this time its the way the Treasury produce forecasts. Just look at this chart which illustrates how "accurate" these forecasts are.

!Amazingly EVERY forecast underestimates borrowing!

Here's the chart, produced by Reform.
http://burningourmoney.blogspot.com/2008/03/systematic-lie.html

The BurningourMoney blogger says:
"Reform's table above tells us all we need to know. It shows how each of the last five years has produced a borrowing outturn up to 9 times higher than the initial government estimate.

"One possibility is incompetence, but blind incompetence would surely have produced a random pattern of errors. Moreover this has been a period where growth has turned out stronger than most expected, so if anything, future borrowing should have been overestimated.

"No, the forecasts have been systematically massaged down throughout the whole period, and the massaging is almost certainly even worse in this Budget."

PS: Oh, and Liam Bryne was on R4 today stating that debt would fall after 2011 period.

Bleedin' outrageous.

Anyway, get a Speccie intern to update that chart and get the recent forecasts the Treasury has made and compare to outturn. You'll see the Treasury alway underestimates borrowing.

PPS: Well done for not only sticking up to Balls, but for reporting his neferious tactics too. The public deserve to know how our politicians behave.

Jim

Here's a comparison that was on itulip.com the other day. When the Argentinian economy collapsed in 2001, the governments fiscal deficit was 3%, external debt was 55%. Next year in Britain, the fiscal deficit will be 14%, external debt will be 90%. That excludes PFI and unfunded state pension. The unfunded pensions equal 80% of GDP.
The clock is ticking louder and louder, those lights you see are not the end of the tunnel, but an express train coming right at you.
Even Cameron has begun to panic in public, talking about riots on the streets. They ring a bell at the top. Ding, ding, it's ringing.
Anyday now foreign investors could panic, when they do sterling crashes. If you don't have a food store you are going to struggle to get through the winter, the government isn't going to have the money to import enough food for everybody. Remember, we import over 50% of our food. Ding, ding. God help you all, life is about to get really ugly.

TrevorsDen

Stonking result - not least you have exposed their mendacious use of syntax and proves that you must analyse every word they say - which is a polite way Mr Balls of saying we do not believe a word you say.

curbishly

It is a lie. Pure and simple and very very clear.

Stand up to these arrogant mendacious thugs.

Sid

This Blog should be brought to the attention of the public via the TV news channels. The blog readers are a small percentage of the population. We need this report on the lies and behavior of government ministers to get far wider coverage.

Jonathan Cook

Fraser,

It is clear that you are the only journalist that Balls and Brown fear. We all saw Brown's face drop when you questioned him at the recent press conference.

Balls is telling a lie. That is absolutely crystal clear.

This blog was the catalyst for pushing the "Labour Lies versus Tory Cuts" story into the wider media. Balls has just cottoned on, very late in the day, that his lies will no longer go unchallenged and he will eventually be exposed in the full public glare, hence his hissy fit with you.

Keep up the good work.

Unixman

Get this into the NOTW on Sunday so that the x million readership of that paper can see Blinky Balls's bullying bluster!!

ag

Balls you're a Liar!

Election Now!

Richard Havers

Go(ed)Balls and go now! On Sunday morning in answer to almost every question from Andrew Marr Balls said, "We shall have to wait and see." Well I'd sooner not wait. Just leave the office tidy for the Conservative that follows you please.

Jackie M Miller

Well done, Fraser. What you have done is exactly what the responsible media should be doing: telling the truth to power on behalf of the public. And it occurs to me, as it clearly has not occurred to our Schools Minister that The Spectator was on the scene long before the New Labour government and that it will still be be here long after it has gone. That's the kind of publication it is.

But I'm aware of the risk you are taking, nonetheless. This Government doesn't merely lie. It fights dirty, too, and never more than now, when it's cornered. Look to your back.

Dennis

It is all too typical. Last night on newsnight Liam Byrne simply would not-or could not-answer a perfectly clear question from Paxman

Janet

I am really fed up with how the government are continually misleading us and this was apparent in the interview this morning. It is also misleading when the PM speaks regarding future public spending. I like many others are aware of how statistical information can be used and abused. I am also upset that the Chancellor's job is being undertaken by the PM and Mr Balls. I am furious that the intellect of the public regarding future spending is treated with contempt - it is unforgiveable of the government to do this.

I do not like to read that someone has lied. I much prefer argument as to why statements can not be substantiated and how manipulation is being employed. You are good at this Fraser!

I am glad Mr Balls is ruffled. I am not surprised by his response - I have read enough political biographies to know how rude he is. I hope he now regrets his response - unbecoming of a Secretary of State which points up his bullying nature and his unsuitability for high office. Oh yes - I have supported the Labour Party for 40+ years. I add this just in case it is thought that all commentators to this blog are neo conservatives!!

TonyE.

Bluster following exposure. The traditional reaction of a mendacious bully.

obangobang

There is, I think, in this little episode, a perfect illustration of how The Crashmeister allowed the UK finances to get into such an appalling state. Brown/Balls' view of economic management is a bit like a homeowner remortgaging their house. They bought the house a couple of years ago for £100,000 and borrowed £80,000. The house is now valued at £150,000, and they are increasing the mortgage to £100,000.

Now, you and I might think that the net effect of this is that the debt has increased by 25% from £80,000 to £100,000. But no, that's a lie. In the Brown/Balls world, debt has actually fallen from 80% to 66.7%. The fact that it will now take another five years to pay off, and the annual cost has increased by a quarter, is not important, because it's not their money they're using to pay for it. And if the value of the house should fall below £100,000, that doesn't matter either, because they can take a longer view and can 'predict' that by 2017/18, the value will be £200,000 and debt will actually have fallen further, allowing them to borrow even more.

Simples.

Max Kaye

Well done Fraser.

Nail the lies and the liars at any and every opportunity.

Perhaps Darling (still the Chancellor, one assumes) can clarify this point in the HoC. A well placed question should elicit an on-the-record comment.

Verity

Over on Guido, 81 comments on this story so far and counting ...

Matthew Sinclair

Fraser,

Great post.

I think, in a way, you're being too generous. For Balls' statement to avoid being seriously misleading the public would need to read two things out of what he said:

1) When he says debt will fall he means debt as a percentage of GDP will fall.

And,

2) When he says Alistair Darling set out plans for debt to fall, he means that Darling set out plans for debt to rise but hopes someone else will cut debt once his plans end.

You've focussed on 1) as the source of the lie but I think 2) is at least as misleading. Combined, they make it pretty clear. He is lying.

boulay

are you ready for the raid on your home and office by anti-terrorist officers fraser??

Al

I read the brown line on the above graph initially as 'Cynically' adjusted net borrowing!

Tricky Dicky

Very simple really - Ed is saying national overdraft still going up but slower. Still more debt not less. Shows he can't be trusted. Good work Fraser!

Simon Stephenson

You can put a tick next to my name too, Fraser.

Brown, Balls, Mandelson, to name but three, are the type of devious manipulators who infiltrated what was previously a largely honourable Labour party. They have used the general public's faith in the institutions of authority to drive through favoured policy through lying about it, its intentions and its probable outcomes.

As I've written before, there is no more serious task for the incoming government after the next election than to make it impossible for such people ever again to work their way into positions of power.

RobC

The truth hurts - more so - when you are telling lies to defend a blatant lie.
Stick it to em Fraser

Alan

I've always thought of cyclically adjusted figures as 'cynically' adjusted ones. Who decides when the cycle starts and stops?

The graph itself is a Brownie because it misses off the bank bailout debt, which elsewhere in the budget document is admitted to push dent to almost 90% of GDP.

It is also *very* important to appreciate that debt expressed as a percentage of GDP is a useful politicial tool but is utterly dependent on the Treasury forecasts of GDP coming true. GDP can of course be fiddled as it includes Government spending. If there is a lot of borrowed spending GDP goes up without the productivity to make it sustainable.

Chris

Cameron can pin Brown down on spending tomorrow. He can ask him to confirm that Health and Education spending will be maintained as confirmed by Ministers of State - but he needs to phrase it in such a way that if brown doesnt answer it will be an assumed yes - and then he needs to ask him if he accepts the IFS reports on Labour cuts of 13.5% if this is the case (noting he is happy to use their 10% figure every week). Then he needs to take the high ground and say it is only adult to discuss problems in a rational way and make Brown look childish.

This would counter the lies. To all those who want to give Balls benefit of the doubt relating to debt ratios I note that the dictionary definition above. Balls admits debt (gross) is going up but uses a hypothetical figure in relation to technical term to show debt is coming down (possibly). So we have untruthful statement as debt ratios are a prediction, and the only reason you would refer to this hypothetical is with the intention to deceive others.
This is the dictionary definition of lying. The skill of a politician is to not make these disprovable statements.

Excellent post Fraser! The number of comments shows how people react when the realise that their British sense of fair play is being abused.

jon dee

Ball's bullying and childlike response to your clear identification of his lies,is in itself,shocking and serious.

Your perception of debt is precisely how rational people see it, and Ball's knows this.The cynical bluster, again McBride like, which he sends your way is in line with the dishonest message he transmits during his tour of the studios.

Apart from your well-argued case, the Sunday Times report of the Brown/Balls approach is frightening. If telling lies is to be the name of the game and they "don't want or need" voters "to understand the nuance of the argument","we just want them to hate the Tories", then God help us all.

Callaghan put country first when he was cornered but this lot will take us all down in order to retain power.

Please keep up your prying. Full exposure as well as disclosure is sorely needed.

Guy Frazer

Vote: Lie. PMQ's tomorrow will be fireworks if DC continues to get The Gorgon to admit misleading the HoC. Brown - Balls = same thing

adrian tebbutt

Dear Mr Balls

Your performance on the radio this morning was brilliant - you showed those Tory lickspittlers at the bbc up for what they really are.
How dare they expect you to get up at the crack of dawn, phone Lord Peter for instructions, memorise them (as they will be completely different from the day before) and then to tell the truth!!

Now, some ghastly hack, in a ghastly toff magazine, called nelson accuses you of lying.
Phone him up and complain, and if no withdrawal is forthcoming send Damien round there.

lawrence greek

And where is Darling amidst all of this? I've heard the irritatingly smug Byrne, Mandleson and now Balls telling their lies during the last two days. Maybe Darling just isn't a sociopath like the rest and can't be trusted to parrot the lies as required. He is, however, still the Chancellor and we deserve to hear him speak.

Angela

Mr Nelson, please, please keep it up. You give us truth with evidence. My daughter's boyfriend, far from dim but by inheritance left-wing, has taken to reading my issues of The Spectator always lying around. He chuckles, but it is a wry recognition of truth. You have a convert :)

Man in a Shed

I wonder what the problem is with Balls & Brown ?

Is it they don't like the truth being told when its inconvenient, or more worryingly do they actually believe what they say ?

Neither is good news for the UK.

cjcjc

This is beautiful.

You/we now need to take this post "viral" - is that the right term?!

disgusted

Bravo Fraser.

stephen

pants on fire. no question.

HDB111

Well done thats a new subscription for your editor, possible to make up for a Ballsup cancellation.

YouCannotBeSerious!

About time that the way in which government tries to bully the media is exposed publicly. I've never understood why journalists think this is part of the game. Good on you for revealing this.

JJ

To what extent is Ed Balls the victim of lying by his cabinet colleagues?

Tim Johnson

Fraser, keep up the excellent work. This is important stuff - the public finances are completely up the creak and vigorous action will be required over many years to get them under control.

I haven't yet figured out whether Brown and Balls are simply in denial - they perhaps cannot believe that could have screwed up so badly and are living in some delusional parallel universe, or whether they have cottoned to on how utterly dire the situation is ...

Whichever way , they are not telling us the truth!

RavingMad

Well done Fraser.

There is little doubt that the New Stassi experiment has failed. The people want their say and they want it NOW

Andre

Balls and Brown are both liars and the press and cyber-media needs to keep on trutholigising them...
Keep up the good work Fraser.

Not the usual biased poster

I see Mr Nelson you are only putting posts up in support of you.....how Cameronesque...how New Tory.

Put a poll up...put a poll up...oh yeah, let's put a poll up.

I thought this is supposed to be a tory website? Al it does is talk about Labouer.

Keep up the Cameron brown tonguing, I can sense the door is ajar for the Special Club.

I will be amazed if you print this, it is not in support of you. Wonder how many you stopped getting through???

Verity

Comments on Guido's blog re Balls's upbraiding of Fraser now up to 206, and counting ...

Oscar India

We're being asked to vote on whether Balls was lying, yes?
Can we also vote on whether the sun went down yesterday and came up again this morning?

Jamie

Mr Fraser,
Thank you.

Mr Balls,
Farewell.

John Page

I have a cartoon in my head - Fraser on the centre court (and he's Scottish too, how topical am I!) whacking tennis balls at a tired Brown on the far side of the net. The tennis balls all have mouths, with bubbles coming out of them saying "debt's coming down". The one Fraser's just hit is also saying OUCH. Caption (of course): Talking balls

Hawkeye

Balls is being deliberatley misleading when he talks about ratios as if it was money. For me that ticks the "Liar" box.

Well done Fraser!

Verity

cjcjc - You can't "take" something viral. It just happens.

Dave S

'Compare the market, Compare the Meerkat'.

'Two completley different things'.

'Simple'.

David Bressloff

Balls this morning sounded like the Foreign Minister of Iran. What have we come too? Watch out for a Basij-style raid on the Speccie's office...

Jingouk

If the Today programme had "the balls" and chose not to be rolled like "Patsies", they would come back to this and pursue it with all their might (maybe that's not a lot).

What public service is being done by allowing Balls to broadcast this crap?

Charles

Balls? More like balls up. You've been caught fair and square Ed - do the decent thing and admit it.

Disillusioned

Excellent post! Continue to expose Balls for what he is. He is widely seen as a mendacious bullying thug trying to sustain a morally bankrupt party in power regardless of the harm to the country as a whole. Roll on the election.

Mike Thomas

Using Ed's own words about being called a liar; "So what?"

Ed Balls is a liar.

Gordon Brown is a liar.

Mick

Beyond parody. Beyond contempt.

I hope this gets picked up in the No 10 press cuts.

Oscar

And this is the man who would be PM?

brian allsdeep

i hope you shouted; BALLS, Balls. you're talking BALLS!

Verity

John Page - V good!

Peter Briffa

The beautiful tragedy of this for Mr. Balls is that, even if he ISN'T lying, none of us believe him, anyway.

Sarah Bell

Shocking and appaling behaviour. Does he not even have his own spinmeister to ring journos up to tell them they're wrong?

The media should be free from government interference. Going down that route leads to even darker places than we are now.

Mark Williams

I hope you make the editors of the Today pogramme aware of this sat and get on their programme tomorrow

Laurence

*I had a more courteous conversation with Balls' excellent SPAD*
This wouldn't be Balshan Izzet, would it? Fulham MP Greg Hands reports less than civil treatment at the hands of this Balls civil servant in his own constituency this morning on Conservative Home.

Nero

There is a subtle difference between Balls and his master. Brown believes that his is the only truth. Balls knows better.

chrisg

Here's a truth that may hurt theseLabourites: "They always leave government with unemployment higher, and they always ruin the economy by spending and borrowing too much. Put that to Balls. He couldn't run a corner shop!

http://www.plenty2say.com

Robin

I m not surprised Ed Balls reads these posts; he's probably trying to understand just how much of a mess they've made of it all. He's a dubious miscreant who was a nobody at university. just like that other great Brown advisor Shriti Vadera who did nothing impressive at university and went on too do nothing impressive at SG Warburg. The pair of them couldn't run a sweetie shop and I sincerely hope they are reading this particular post and recognise how transparent their little plan is.

They came inot government before the internet began but are leaving government as its most mendacious and mlicious victims.

Good riddance; we are going to get more honesty in politics because search engines will be the undoing of the most diligent spin doctor.

dorothy wilson

Mr Balls:

As you grew up in Keyworth, which is about 4 miles from where I'm writing this, you may be aware of an old country saying around these parts: "he can lie faster than an 'oss can gallop". That is exactly the impression you gave on the Today programme this morning. Was the galloping pace you adopted intended to gloss over the lies?

And Liam Bryne gave exactly the same impression on the World at One this lunch time.

Mike Taylor

I have just watched Ball v Grove in the Commons this afternoon. There is no way Ball's is leadership material. He stumbles get his words out. He looks and sounds frustrated and scary. Joe Public would see straight through him very quickly.

logdon

This has to confirm it. Best political site on the internet? If it angers senior Gov ministers to such ire that they'll try to curtail media freedom with desparate phone calls, it has to be up there with the best.

OK, I'm no naif and realise this is nothing new. Peter Oborne's two recent books detail the dirty tricks but seemingly the media frozen out, or outright insulted by the Labour bullying claque have never repeated the calls in print or outed the bulliers for what they most certainly are.

Cossetted by a compliant BBC which they ripped apart after Kelly. Never knowingly undersold by the Aaranovitches, Rawnsley's, Richards' Toynbee's and Ashley's they coasted as if teflon coated through minefields which would and should have raised ire in unpartisan journalists.

For me, two events have created this seachange. One the Guido expose of McBride and labour's frantic dirty dissembling to discredit and two. the Telegraph's historic coup in revealling the extraordinary rip off of MP expenses.

Brown seemed to survive the previous expose's and cock up's such as the ten p tax debacle and that motley crew listed above did all they could to ameliorate the flak. Toynbee’s at it again today but no one is listening.

So immersed in political manouvering they’ve lost sight of the big picture, that thing known as voters. When they can treat the North as mere ballot fodder or honesty as a flexible narrative what has happened to a once principled party?

Voters are deserting in droves yet the fix is more idiotic intelligence insulting lies which the internet can disprove in a trice.

Brown, himself is appearing more and more unhinged. He pinned his hope on the 10% Tory line and it has backfired. Despite that at last weeks PMQ’s it was as if he was taken over by an invasion of the ten percent body snatchers. On and on as if repeated enough times we’d accept it.

Yesterdays performance was just as bad. Either his famed, rehash as new tack, or the outright dishonesty of housing allocation or individual pupil mentoring, both not just unlikely, but impossible. We know it. They know it so why the lies?

Old habits die hard I guess.

The Woodster

How annoying. This is so good I will have to renew my subscription to the Spectator - cancelled when they gave space to the loathsome Hattersley.

logdon

This has to confirm it. Best political site on the internet? If it angers senior Gov ministers to such ire that they'll try to curtail media freedom with desparate phone calls, it has to be up there with the best.

OK, I'm no naif and realise this is nothing new. Peter Oborne's two recent books detail the dirty tricks but seemingly the media frozen out, or outright insulted by the Labour bullying claque have never repeated the calls in print or outed the bulliers for what they most certainly are.

Cossetted by a compliant BBC which they ripped apart after Kelly. Never knowingly undersold by the Aaranovitches, Rawnsley's, Richards' Toynbee's and Ashley's they coasted as if teflon coated through minefields which would and should have raised ire in unpartisan journalists.

For me, two events have created this seachange. One the Guido expose of McBride and labour's frantic dirty dissembling to discredit and two. the Telegraph's historic coup in revealling the extraordinary rip off of MP expenses.

Brown seemed to survive the previous expose's and cock up's such as the ten p tax debacle and that motley crew listed above did all they could to ameliorate the flak. Toynbee’s at it again today but no one is listening.

So immersed in political manouvering they’ve lost sight of the big picture, that thing known as voters. When they can treat the North as mere ballot fodder or honesty as a flexible narrative what has happened to a once principled party?

Voters are deserting in droves yet the fix is more idiotic intelligence insulting lies which the internet can disprove in a trice.

Brown, himself is appearing more and more unhinged. He pinned his hope on the 10% Tory line and it has backfired. Despite that at last weeks PMQ’s it was as if he was taken over by an invasion of the ten percent body snatchers. On and on as if repeated enough times we’d accept it.

Yesterdays performance was just as bad. Either his famed, rehash as new tack, or the outright dishonesty of housing allocation or individual pupil mentoring, both not just unlikely, but impossible. We know it. They know it so why the lies?

Old habits die hard I guess.

Prodicus

Friendly word to the wise, Ed, old boy.

Don't be a bigger arse than you have to be. Try not to get caught in public with your shorts around your ankles which is what your little outburst today amounts to. It shatters one's dignity which, in your position, may be all you have left. Yelling at an industrious media-blogger makes you look like a thuggish twerp. It alienates other journalists just when you are running short of friends in that quarter. If you really can’t help yourself, try to remember that although the Speccie’s readership is dominated by Tory anoraks, your target may have other readers, such as the C2D types who lap up Fraser Nelson’s thoughts over at the News of the Screws on whose votes you may have to depend for a few votes. As to the substance of thing, you might want to think about picking a fight with a bloke whose figures are all public domain and verifiable when the gist of his point is that your own figures are not quite… well, d’you see what you did there?

Oh, and I lied about 'friendly'.

Dodgy Geezer

Congratulations for not being browbeaten.

I vote for "lie". I also vote for "fraudulent untruth", "falsehood", "cheating fraudster" and any other accurate description of our current administration, which, I am afraid, comprises most politicians of all parties, most senior 'civil servants' and all assorted hangers-on.

Jeremy

No wonder all the education system seems capable of producing are dumbed-down, uncritical illiterates. It suits the political purposes of creatures like Balls to keep it that way...

philip walling

It's not the amount of debt, but whether you can pay it back when the time comes.
It's hard to see where the effort is going to come from to make the money needed in the future.
The people who were young when the last boom began (that has just ended) were given great opportunities to make money and took them with alacrity.
Where are the young people who are going to get us out of this mess and what opportunities are there for them? The state has so circumscribed business with regulation to give the armies of state apparatchiks something to do that the only growth is in utterly pointless state activities.
God help us all - revolution might not be enough.

David Ossitt

H Taylor

"You both sound pathetic and immature"

HT are you a Mandelson plant?
or just stupid.

TrevorsDen

Stonking result - not least you have exposed their mendacious use of syntax and proves that you must analyse every word they say - which is a polite way Mr Balls of saying we do not believe a word you say.

bill

You can't juxtapose real spending that will definately happen, against growth they forecast. Especially as every growth forecast provided so far by the government has been wrong. Total debt in £ is the only accurate way to measure debt in this charade of government.

Ian Alexander

He lying - where is the poll

Hector

How can Balls/Brown make long term projections on debt on one hand and refuse to make shorter term projections on budgeted spending on the other?
Excellent stuff Fraser.

Sam

Well done and well said Fraser !

Mr Balls clearly ommits the n from "line to take ".

And how was that again about "Tory bullying " ?

Hope the media follow through.

Verity

A hundred and seventy plus comments here and over 300 on Guido. This would lead one to conclude that the thuggish Ed "So what?" Balls is held in universal contempt.

I have not seen a single comment defending him. It is unbelievable that the British Cabinet has come to this. Absolutely astonishing.

Judy

Thank you for this. I've come to realise you're one of the most trustworthy and incisive commentators on all the political parties. This is an amazing story--direct pressure from a minister, followed by what looks like evidence of follow-up attempts to put direct pressure on your editor.

Please keep it up. Thanks for refusing to buckle.

Hysteria

Fabulous stuff - leaving aside the debt issue (bad enough) the idea of a Minister (FFS!)calling the media and demanding a retraction is astonishing.

Ain't the interweb a wonderful thing!

Swiss Bob

Damn, I probably should have posted this here if it's allowed:

Gove responds to Balls education statement in Parliament today: Gove Gives Balls a Dose.

Pure comedy.

Edward Sutherland.

Keep up the great work, Fraser, and continue to expose the lies, deceit, mendacity etc., etc. of this bankrupt government.

Andy

I thought Ed's job was to balls up education further; I didn't realise he was still at the Treasury. Still doesn't mean he was telling the truth, though. Put up the poll; I want to tick the "he's lying" box.

Scottyboy

All this goes to show how important it is going to be on the next year to expose the lies because if we don't the lies will get bigger and some will believe them. There was a day not that long ago when politicians who were caught lying would be forced to resign. These unashamed liars have no scruples at all - let's make sure we keep the pressure up all the way to May 2010.

Occasional Ostrich

So, let me get this right: It's OK for Balls to call Fraser a liar, But it's not OK for Fraser to call Balls a liar, just 'cos 'e was on the ryedio when 'e said wot 'e said. Hm?

Mrs B

Bring it on!

Steve.W

Hello Ed, me again, this post now has over 170 responses, see how popular you are! I bet your boss is proud of you. Also you deserve a long title like that chap from Brussels, think one up and DEMAND it! The PM needs people like you.

Rob C

I can think of a few things that this government is reducing: incomes, standards (both moral & living), their own credibility and their chance of ever governing again. However, debt is certainly not one that comes close. Debt (personal & government), tax, poverty, unemployment, state interference and blood pressure are all very much on the rise. I never thought I'd reach the day, but if there was a civil war tomorrow, I'd be out there! What is most worrying is that almost everyone I speak to feels the same and that isn't a good for any of us. Labour have betrayed the country and its people, but above all their biggest betrayal is the social and economic cesspit our children will inherit - that REALLY makes me angry! Given Dictator Brown's purported 'care' for children and child poverty, anyone religious will surmise that he will rot in Hell for his 'achievements' of the last 12 years. I'm still undecided if it really is malicious destruction for some misaligned political ideal or just crass incompetence? I hope it's the latter, but fear it could have been by design...

Watervole

Let's all have a nice poll, better still, a General Election so that little Ed can spend more time on his sums. What a hoon!

Stephen R Jones

On the basis of Balls I can say my earned income is rising even though it has actually fallen by £11,400 per annum. However expressed as a ratio of my earned income to interest income I am actually better off with rising income.

Why thank you Balls - you silly little arrogant specimen of a human being.

David Waters

Fraser, you are bloody brilliant!

Jane

Fantastic work Fraser, this is what journalism should be about. If only your colleagues on the broadsheets and TV had the guts and conviction to do likewise. Expose the liars for what they are, I say. And keep going too, with the blessing of the voting public!

Richard

I nearly choked this morning listening to this unctuous little berk who apparently is a cabinet minister.

New Labour doesn't lie. They have their own version of the truth. The Iraq War was a case in point.

Its like the use 'investment', spending' and 'reducing poverty', runaway social security spending, etc in their argument.

Keep up the good work!

Alexandrovich

Please consider poor old Pete Hoskin. He moderates alone.

Chingford Man

Hope you deloused yourself, Fraser.

EC

Border Reiver @ 1:47pm

"The general election is going to be a pub fight - Motherwell Rules.

Yup Culloden 2! Then we'll be rid of the Scottish Raj, Balls n all, not to mention Mr & Mrs Kinnock-io.

Verity

Rob C - It was by design. From Day One. Blair was the Trojan horse, but he was completely in accord with the programme. Many people were lulled into a false sense of security because he didn't look or speak like "one of them". On the basis of 'don't frighten the horses'.

It worked. The naifs all took him at face value and voted for him. How could they have missed all the neon signs flashing the word "con" that followed him everywhere?

Marian C

Bravo Fraser. Don't let this lying scumbag get away with anything.

Fraser can we have a poll? A General Election would be much better of course, but a specie poll would suffice for now.

Mr Balls, if you are reading this; please tell your ‘Boss’ that we want a GENERAL ELECTION!

mouse1

Well done Fraser. I hope you'll be talking about this in your NotW column - assuming, that is, that McBride and co don't get you sacked from the paper before it's printed, which I assume they're hard at work trying to do.

Marian C

Rob C
"I'm still undecided if it really is malicious destruction for some misaligned political ideal or just crass incompetence? I hope it's the latter, but fear it could have been by design..."

Its probably both.

TrevorsDen

Gosh is this the record for Speccie posts. well done Balls for boosting traffic.

Meantime - this is what Greg Hands has to say about brown/Balls visit to his local school today.

http://conservativehome.blogs.com/centreright/2009/06/how-not-to-be-prime-ministerial-on-a-pm-visit.html

not very complimentary mabouts Balls' SPAD

Tim Harper

Balls seems to have become the 'Portillo' of this government

Steve Green (Daily Referendum Blog).

Fraser,

They are rattled. The "Liar" tag is sticking and they don't like it.

Tom Harris MP has just banned the word Liar from his blog:

Undergarments not on fire (at least not on this site)

Bob.India

Fraser: Wonderful! You continue to perform great services to the Nation we are all desperate to reclaim. A poll would be marvelous.

Stephen Byrne

I reckon that Mr Balls probably believes what he says. In ordinary terms, though, I believe that he intends to mislead and deceive the wider public. The current Government's main concern is to create and leave as much mayhem as possible for the next Government so that the Labour Party can then return to power in the general-election-after-next. This irresponsibility with the public finances, and thus with the wealth and happiness of everyone of us, is despicable.

14 SECONDS

He has a point. It's all aquestion of semantics. It's not lies. It's Balls.

john miller

The trolls on here might like to note that on this website you can still be published if you disagree with what has been said.

As for a website controlled by your comrades,well, Mr Balls is illustrating that that would not be the case.

strapworld

mouse 1..that is an extremely threatening comment..I do hope mouse 1 is not the objectionable McBride-remembering that we can all be traced back!!!

News of the World would champion Fraser Nelson and it will sell more copies!

Bruce Finch

Fraser well done. Ed Balls is a grotesque, ridiculous, wimp and proven liar, without integrity who is deservedly disliked in his own party and whose cabinet career, we earnestly hope, will be deservedly short - ending by 2010 for ever. He epitomises everything that is bad about his unspeakable, weirdo, master, the worst Prime Minister since Lord North. Keep up the good work.

David Ossitt

Not the usual biased poster
June 30th, 2009 3:44pm

"I see Mr Nelson you are only putting posts up in support of you.....how Cameronesque...how New Tory".

Ntubp how new labour of you.

Robert

Yes I agree . Brown and Balls are liars. So is Cameron when he promises a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty ( but only if it's not ratified).

Chris

Slightly off topic but Alan Johnson moved into a equally surreal logic on PM tonight.

On ID Cards: - (07:15, P show 30/06/09) "If you try and compel people ..... it actually is counter productive whereas if you explain the benefits and encourage and make it a voluntary process you will get a far bigger take up and a better reaction"

Now i wholeheartedly agree that not forcing everyone to carry an ID card will be a more popular for the government, but I dont see how he can argue that you will get a bigger take up than everyone. It's just not possible. I suppose he may argue that mass civil disobedience may have reduced ID card implementation, but it doesnt say much about it as a policy in the first place.

Stephen

I think this is very revealing -(1) does he really expect anybody to believe that garbage about ratios? (2) why did he lose it to the extent of trying to bully you? This deserves the most public airing, as we have gone on for 12 years with only the cognoscenti knowing this kind of thing was going on - but now there can be no mistake!

GV

Brown, Balls, Byrne - liars all.

Simon Stephenson

Stephen Byrne : 7.06pm

"I reckon that Mr Balls probably believes what he says"

No he doesn't. He's taking a set of figures and plucking from them only what he can use to create a specious assertion that shows him and his party in as good a light as possible.

He's not attempting to give any sort of rational picture derived from the figures. He's not saying that things are perhaps not as bad as they look - which would be acceptable politics. He's saying that things aren't as they are, which is abusing the trust that Ministers of the Crown are given by the public - and upon which the continuation of democracy relies.

He and his like need to be banished from politics for ever.

Verity

Robert - Correct. Cameron will not push for a GE until after Lisbon is ratified.

Actually, it doesn't matter a rat's arse if it's ratified because our membership in the EU was never put to a vote of the British people and therefore our membership has no legitimacy.

Morgan

Vote one more for Balls talking utter balls. Liars the lot of them.

Not that the Tories will be any better; let's not fool ourselves.

John Bell

All of the above is true but remember they only have to fool enough of the people (22% of total electorate in 2005)for enough of the time to get elected.

A Seabright

Well done. keep up the good work of holding this government to account.

Simon Stephenson

Chris : 7.41pm

"If you try and compel people ..... it actually is counter productive whereas if you explain the benefits and encourage and make it a voluntary process you will get a far bigger take up and a better reaction"

Did Alan Johnson actually say this, Chris? If so, it's difficult to imagine anything more brass-necked than a member of this government, with its thousands of new laws, suggesting that voluntary approaches may work better than compulsion.

If they've had a change of heart, all I can say is that it's a pity they hadn't had it 12 years ago.

But I expect that it's no more than a bit of deceitful PR to try to milk some undue credit from the cancellation of the ID cards programme. Is Johnson unprincipled enough to do this? You bet he is! He's New Labour.

Stu

If Balls isn't lieing then I guess he should be able to take you to court for defamation, after all Liar is a pretty strong term to use in an article. I suspect given the fact that Balls and his master are unable to tell the truth about anything you must feel prettty safe.

Swiss Bob

Mr Hoskin, Nelson,

Thanks for allowing the link, I have been inundated with vistors wishing to see the video of Gove making a mockery of Balls in Parliament today.

He really is hated.

Comment 213?

Obama Berach

Thanks to you Fraser.

It does take balls to deal with the likes of Balls for such like can be most highly minatory.

However, although Balls is a liar we need to look more closely at the possible reason for his lying.

Is he merely trying to save himself or is he making a last ditch attempt to save the Brown-Blair deconstruction of Britannia project?

James Barr

Balls n' Cooper are sound -bite cretins. Brown is a Jock Socialist thug who trumpets his Presbyterian Conscience and lies like a drain. This rabble of second-raters are well past their sell-by date. Call an election and give us the chance to send the Labour project into oblivion.

Cardinal Richelieu's mole

So Balls is a liar!

I saw him on Ch4 News with Snow talking about school tutors - sounded ok but then I realised he must be lying so just laughed at him.

William Blakes Ghost

Brown = Liar
Balls = Liar
Brown + Balls = Freakin' Great Whoppers!

Moorlandhunter

Everyone knows Labour are lying except the deluded and lying Labour government. Brown, Balls and the rest are like Nero, fiddling away whilst Rome burns, or in this case the UK going down the plughole.
Well done and keep up the free speech of stating that Balls and Brown are liars.
To see Balls trottting out his crap on TV is so puke inducing

simon s

What's surprising is that Balls is seen as a great intellect and future Leader of the Labour party. Doesn't he understand how badly he comes across and how the rhetorical tricks and spin simply don't work anymore. And his wife his even worse. Private and grammar school educated.

mouse1

Strapworld 7.19pm, I'm right behind Fraser, and hope he does savage them in the NotW! Apologies if I've unintentionally misled anyone... perhaps the behaviour of the Dear Leader and his sidekick Goebbels have been getting to me.

James March

What sort Country has the UK become when we have a PM and a coven of Ministers who are actively preparing to mislead the voters in the next election?
In order to retain power they are asking us to trust them with our vote when they are selling a big lie - what sort of morality and leadership is this?

john miller

So, more evidence of free speech under Labour. Even Tom Harris has banned a word from his blog.

I wonder if Cameron was lying he would feel so morally compelled?

I have a feeling that if this can stagger on for 6 days and make it into the NotW you may make something significant with this, Fraser.

JohnOfEnfield

I presume we (anyone - Gove, Osbourne, Cameron, John of Enfield) can all now say to Balls' face that "Fraser Nelson says you are a liar - are you going to sue him?".

Presumably if he doesn't sue you we can continue to remind him that you called him a liar until he takes you to court. Until he does sue you, we know that he accepts that he IS a liar. After all, Britain is the libel capital of the world - very easy to sue, very easy to prove your case for libel & gigantic returns on your investment (for the person who claims they have been libelled).

All in all, it would be very strange if he didn't sue!!

I want you know that we are all with you.

Dave

If you're not careful he'll get someone to go and do an independent review that totally agrees with what he said in the first place. Oh wait, he's already tried that one. Badman review, anyone?

DCSF takes its lead from him as well, some of their recent output appears to be lacking in truth and facts. Or I'm on the wrong planet.

Fony Blair

Can we have a "number of lies told" league table on the front page of the coffee house please and then ask all blogs to link to it permanently.

Bertrand Russell's Ghost

Damned nuisance - now I've got to add this brilliant blog to my growing list. Well done for standing up to Balls misinformation. He has just hired his friend Graham BADMAN (until recently boss of Kent schools - where 33 secondary schools are 'failing' - more than any other county) to write a review to force home educated kids back to failing schools on the basis of the lie that home education is a cover for child abuse. No doubt next he will be hiring BADMAN to recommend that those who see through his voodoo economics should be sent to these failing schools for correctional economic re-education. They are true stalinists. Orwell where are you!

Jim F

Balls was on Today programme today. When asked to explain HIS policies he immediately reverted to lies and misrepresentation of his opponent's position, saying that the same money as he is spending on schools will be used to finance an inheritance tax cut. It is slimy, GROSS misrepresentation and a lie that an inheritance tax cut, if it happens, will even "touch the sides" in comparison with this Government's debt position.

Tania berlow

and....please take a look at he elective home education review and it's implications for civil liberties and ALL families in the uk-and read EHE families reactions. Maybe an article will be forthcoming?

Beowulff

Brilliant. Well done.

At last the lying scum are being exposed for what they are, truly incompetent, despicable, and deceitful lying scum.

I wouldn't be so angry if they weren't lying to destroy the future of Olde Angle Lande and its innocent folk, who don't understand the devious lies behind the double speak, coated as it is with pseudo respectability by the State Media Machine.

Keep up the good work.

May the Border Reivers prevail !

Madame Defarge

Utterly stunning Fraser. I wish to have your babies.

Travis Bickle

"However, although Balls is a liar we need to look more closely at the possible reason for his lying."

Er, no - it's what Socialist politicians do, end of.

Pete, Scotland

Swiss Bob, good link.

Was impressed by Gove.

John Moss

I just love the description, "cyclically adjusted net debt".

Is that from the same stable as, "neo-endogenous growth theory"?

Either way, both are "BALLS"!

Derek

How do you know that it was really Mr. Balls calling, and not merely some impersonator whose object was to bring scorn, shame and disgrace on the Labour Party?

H Mills

I'm counting the days until 4th May 2010 - Good riddance to Billy Liar and the rest of them....

Gladiatrix

Why do journalists or bloggers put up with this kind of behaviour. This is clear misconduct by an MP and Ed Balls should be reported to the Parliamentary Commissioner for gross misconduct, and bringing the offices of MP and Secretary of State into disrepute.

Humpty D.

For God's sake Fraser, he means what he says, no more and no less.

Do get a grip boy.

Ex Bootneck

Good shot Fraser...the man formerly known as 'blinky' should now be known as 'deflated balls'

Yours Aye

Boy on a bike

Balls is talking bollocks.

Simon

An excellent article, from a journalist whose active questioning clearly probes into the lies spouted by all members of this corrupt Government. My blood was boiling after I had the misfortune to hear this odious man on Radio 4 this morning; every supposed interview reveals their extensive lies and attempts to smear the opposition whilst clearly demonstrating that they have no policies to deal with the mess caused by their economic policies drafted from the lunatic asylum. As you say, anyone with a mortgage undertsands that a reduction in the outstanding liability is a reduction in debt, and no-one talks about the ratio of debt to annual or monthly earnings.

thegrizz

Well done Mr Nelson. Thank you for standing up for these thugs!

lance out of neighbours

pretty poor form from the spectator

the national debt is almost always expressed as a percentage figure. Gordon Brown's golden rule on borrowing - which he has broken himself - was expressed as a percentage.

so labour has always referred to the debt in that form.

I doubt there can be more than a handful of people who would know what the UK's debt is as an exact figure. I certainly can't

By contrast, the 40% figure, the 55% that debt currently stands at (or 81.5% if the nationalised banks are taken into account) are all relatively common knowledge. all were in the metro this morning.

Expressing the debt as a proportion of gdp is standard practice - it's eminently more sensible tnah doing so as an outright sum, as the spectator has done. it's a bit like Labour boasting about rises in income since 1997 without taking into account inflation.

desperate political pointscoring from fraser if you ask me, though as the comments show on this page, very effective.

Balls response certainly hasn't helped though. I find that sort of hamfisted approach from a government minister, totally lacking in interpersonal skills, far more worrying than the way he presents the economic figures.

Michael Lloyd

Ot doesn't matter whether you call Ball's statement as a lie or a terminological inexactitude. It was clearly designed to confuse the media, and to create the impression that "Things can only get Better!" Very New Labour!

R.McGeddon

Brown/Balls are taking a leaf directly from Goebbels' book:-

“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.”

Labour lies - large, ludicrous and loony

Deborah

Fraser, you're a star.

You're absolutely right - we all feel terribly brave when we use words like "porkies". We need to stop pussyfooting and use plain english - a lie is a lie.

Brussels 1049

Fraser, you have the cojones to take on Balls, well done. The only pity of the desperate acceleration of mendacity from the Labour bunker is that even dedicated bloggers cannot keep up, never mind the MSM. In that respect, what has happened about Balls' recent spat in his day job about who was telling the truth over the SATS fiasco? If Balls has again been economical with the actualité, he ought to be hounded from office for that alone, but the trail seems to have gone stale.

MF

I've known what prize sh*ts this guy and his wife are since reading Oborne's book. New Labour have been plumbing the depths of ruthless mendancity for years. The day cannot come soon enough when this crowd of toadying cheats are called to account in the general election.

Balls by Name

What an own goal. Made me take my eye off the BNP website for a few minutes. Well done Spex!

Patrick

Pants on fire!

Balls and Brown are so used to bullying their way around that they think we are afraid of them. Bad call. We laugh at you.

Not only are you liars, you are pathetically incompetent liars.

The General election will see you flushed down the toilet bowl of history. Bye Bye New Labour. Good riddance.

AC

Brown, Balls, Darling, McBride, we will not let you get away with this.

Captain Mainwaring

Outstanding Fraser!
They don't like it up them!

jose garcia

CONGRATULATIONS FRASER

EXCELLENT WORK!!!!!

I am starting to read you on a regular basis

johnny come lately.

FRASER NELSON
"The man the government tried to muzzle"

"This man has BALLS!"

"The man who told Balls he talks Balls"

Vai Tibi

Well done Fraser - Balls talks balls.

Swiss Bob

Fraser,

I'm probably pushing my luck here with this link but I've YouTubed you from last nights Newsnight.

Very entertaining it was too.

Also Gove, Croker & Paxo going at it. Politics, the new soap.

Fraser Nelson – “Ed Balls is a Liar”.

Dominic

Well Done Fraser. These people never seek to amaze me. Never has a government told so many lies to so many people!
Keep up the great work. THEY ARE LIARS!!!!!!!!!!!!

Boudicca

Balls is a Liar - and they're not even his own original lies. He's just repeating the lies of his master's voice.

Put up the poll Fraser, and publish the article and the results in the News of the World this Sunday.

That might teach this most repulsive of Ministers - in a large field of candidates - not to try and bully journalists.

Simon Stephenson

lance out of the neighbours : 11.21pm

Desperate nonsense I'm afraid.

The Spectator's claim is that Balls has used nebulous finger-in-the-air figures from the far reaches of the Budget to proclaim on national radio a state of affairs that is completely different from what the rest of the Budget is implying, and every economic commentator knows is happening.

Fraser Nelson's not saying that the figures Balls uses aren't in the Budget but he is saying that to make the claim that Balls did on the Today programme is to mislead the public as to what the actual situation is. This is not the cut and thrust of political debate - it's deliberate deception for advantage. In the commercial world it would be called fraud. Lies.

oldtimer

Blair was far better at plausible deniability than Balls. No doubt, when the full history comes to be told of recent advances in propaganda techniques, the Balls gaff will be up there as an example of how not to do it.

There is also no doubt that New Labour have advanced the black arts of propaganda over the past 12 to 15 years. Mostly they have got away with it but the paint is now beginning to peel to reveal the gimcrack structures that lie beneath.

For those that care to look, another artifice is under construction to support the cuts vs investment lie. Deferment of the next spending review is the clue.

Roger Machin

I agree with Tania (June 30th, 2009 9:53pm). Ed Balls in role at the DCSF is even more frightening than he is as surrogate Chancellor. The Home Education review is a report based on lies and is an abuse of civil liberties and the family. He hates us.

You should look into this, Fraser.

David H

I wonder what education advisers in his department would make of Balls, Secretary of State for Schools n'stuff, bullying a journalist, lying and making numerous "mistakes" in his work/expenses? Is he employable?

Robert Bauer

Michael Jackson may have popularised Moonwalking (giving the illusion of moving forward, but actually going backward!), but the Labour Party has perfected it!

Mark M

Shame we hadn't been exposing their lies sooner. This country hasn't run a surplus since 2001, yet we constantly let Brown get away with his "we have reduced debt" line because debt as a % of GDP was coming down.

That lie is the reason we are set to borrow so much this year. Brown was running £40bn deficits when we had plenty of money. Had he been even slightly competent he would have be running £40bn surpluses, then when the crisis came the boom in borrowing would have meant ~£90bn peak borrowing, not £175bn as we are about to have.

The cost of this crisis is nowhere near as much as the cost of Brown between 2001 and 2008.

Mr Natural

Ed Balls’s presentational skills would make an estate agent blush. He’s also playing “Find the Lady” with the education budget, and in the process pissing the lot up the wall.

LiberalHammer

Bravo for calling Balls a liar. As he is. Meanwhile Guardian sorts call it an 'unconvincing narrative'. I wish they had the conviction you do. By any reasonable interpretation Balls is lying.

Steve Hemingway

This is a wonderful piece of journalism about an odious politician. Congratulations to you and the Spectator team. The comments are wonderful. At last the power of the Internet, and in particular 'user content' is starting to be felt in challenging the power of the big parties to control the news agenda.

IanH

He's not just a liar, he's a stinking turd of a liar, just like his Boss and the rest of the slime. I hope he and they rot in a glass walled jail in the tower so we can go visit them.

Wilfred

Steve, the comments may be wonderful to you, but you're in a self-regarding bunker, old chap. As we approach the election, Fraser has started filtering out any comments that counter the prevailing dogma of the Cameron-Nelson axis.

In today's PMQs Brown specifically explained the point about future capital spending being brought forward, thus exposing Cameron's previous week's "lie" jibe as, in fact, a lie.

Not the usual biased poster

Wilfred - Very true, sent in three posts that was not Fraser up Cameron friendly, got one posted.....nice to see the Fraser up Cameron axis in it's true light.

Wily Trout

Wilfred, or is it Ed, if comments were being filtered out for countering the prevailing Cameron-Nelson axis, yours would be being filtered out. Instead, they are busy filtering out mine, probably because they are unoriginal and unamusing. Not that I'm bitter.

Philip

Well done to the Spectator for standing up to these devious mendicants. All power to the blogs to expose their doublespeak, if something goes down it goes down, not up less slowly.

I can see the defence to a speeding ticket now..."But officer, I couldn't have been speeding, I was definitely accelerating less quickly"

Giles

Fraser, you are wrong. Balls was not lying, there are perfectly reasonable interpretations to put on his words. This sort of self-righteous melodrama could only be found on . . . well, the Internet.

http://www.freethink.org/index.php/freethinkers/5-freethinkers/384-nelson-debate-balls

Don't be fooled into thinking your analysis is write just because of the ditto-heads writing below.

David Ossitt

Giles

Silly boy freethink is a socialist blog so they would side with Balls wouldn't they?

That's News

It wasn't a lie. It was just utter Balls.

(Oh, OK. It WAS a lie. But it was utter Balls, too)

TheseBootsAreMadeForKicking

Balls you are a liar.

It seems you cannot comprehend why you are judged to be so.

If it helps, I would be prepared to kick some sense into you.

mikh43

An issue of semantics? Do sen him a copy of 1984 - Orwell predicted this!
I am quite old - and have never been so angry with a British Government as with the lies and deception from Brown and his henchmen.
Take down the post? No - take down the government! In the interests of our (the voters') country.
The only difference I can see between Mugabe and Brown is that Mugabe was elected.

Pat Morgan

Has anyone noticed how Ed Balls eyes keep getting bigger and bigger the more he lies. He also seems to get very excited when he's talking - appearing to jump up and down as if he wants to go to the toilet.

His partner Yvette Cooper seems to be the same - only she puts on the "little girl lost" look when being interviewed.

I think they both must practice together in their free time.

Pat

Steve.W

300 responses coming up by the end of the week on this? I hope so, as it will show the depth of anger felt by the public.

ChrisP

Excellent article - well said.

Talwin

Sorry to come to this post so late but have been away. However did not want to miss any opportunity to vent spleen at the odious, mendacious and deeply unpleasant Balls. Did his father never tell him that he must always tell the truth?

Nick

Run it past the Campaign for Clear English & see what they think.

Steve in London

Brown/Balls are not liars.

I have a horrible feeling that they now believe their own spin!

2trueblue

What along time it has been in coming; someone who is not afraid to say it as it is. This government have been treated very favourably by the media for 12 yrears and think that they have a supine and stupid electorate. We know them for what they are and await our opportunity to see them off. You are so right. the public do understand how finances work and they are talking balls, totally. We have a very ignorant group of people in power at present who assume that we are of the same ilk. Would that there were more journalists who had the balls and intellect to see the truth.

Simon Roberts

Edward Balls! Gotcha! What about that repulsive wife of his? Anyone remember her faking a coughing fit during the Commons announcement on home information packs. Does anyone in the government actually bother to understand what a complete disaster HIPs are? They perfectly typify the bone-headedness and arrogance of this spent government. I just cannot wait to see the back of Ed and Yvette. Truly awful awful people.

MTJM

LIE. bright man but a shameful human being. Psychopath? Destined for the dustbin.

Tonus

Pride and Ego = Balls and Brown...and what happens...pride & ego develops before a fall...its coming soon. The sooner the better!

Bring on the election NOW!

Roger Thornhill

A lie, which is why Balls resorted to Bullying 101.

The man is unfit for public office.

Some might say he was not capable of running a bath but I'd say that is not fair. He can, as long as it is for himself.

Richard Felber

Thank you for making us home educators happy by getting Balls angry. This odious man wants to stop autonomous home education and force all of us to have a Balls education. Unsurprisingly I do not wish my child to become a professional liar so I'd rather emigrate than send her to a Balls school.

Greavsie

When Brown makes Balls a Privy Councillors he should have an amended title: Wrong Dishonourable - he's earned it.

Paul Austin

I hope this subject can be revisited - the subject of 'lies'...am I too late to add my comments at this point?

Huw Thomas

In a way you have proved his point. Using the word 'lies' in this context devalues the use of that word. Most of us know what lies are, and that this isn't such a case. But I think you've had some fun doing it and, with the weather being as it is, you're probably sat indoors.