Cruddas's intervention

TrevorsDen

‘what does Labour stand for any more?’ --- where has he been? Isn't he 12- 16 years too late to ask that question?

No matter what if any problems this gives Brown, it is all just unreconstructed spend spend spend socialism.
Total gibberish.

'heart' -- 'give labour a purpose' ??
Based on what Darling said today Labour are still in total denial about the reality of what they have unleashed on the UK.
If giving labour a purpose is to position them firmly in Alice in Wonderland then it does not look helpful to me.

Walsingham's Ghost

Forget Purnell, Miliband or Balls - as I have said on previous occasions, Cruddas is the future Leader of (what is left of) the Labour Party post Brown. He is untainted by scandal or innuendo, has the support of the Labour grass roots and isn't seen as a part of any faction. His policies are nonsense of course, but then if it plays well to the Labour gallery, who cares...

WG

James J

Did he go back to his Notting Hill home or his Dagenham constituency?

Victor Southern

A few Labour MPs are starting to recover their consciences and their guts.

Several dozen are quitting.

The remainder neither know nor care what Labour stands for - it is their meal ticket.

Ray

"The policies Cruddas is proposing do not seem to acknowledge the state of the public finances".

Damn! said the starry-eyed socialist, why does money always have to come into all good discussions about the kind of things I'd like to see happen?

TrevorsDen

Having just seen Fraser and Rawnsley on Newsnight it seems to me both Nelson and Paxman missed the point when Rawnsley said if you cut govt spending too soon it will stifle the recovery.

The fact is (well its a fact to me) that the deficit is a drag anchor on recovery. High debt must lead to higher interest rates and high tax. The recovery squashed before it even gains a footing.

Rawnsley proposition was analogous to saying its OK to eat your own liver to stay alive.

We need to cut the deficit and the debt to reduce interest payments and to make room for the tax cuts we need to sustain a real recovery and to encourage the benefits generation back into work.

Yet again I point it out - Rawnsley (a la Darling) is claiming that 'growth' will pay of the debt.
Get real - 12 years of Labour 'growth' saw the deficit increase (£200 billion is the total figure I have seen).
A return to growth (a lower trend growth to boot) will not be able to sustain current services never mind pay off debt.

Kittler

Labour = socialism. How deluded you are Trevor. This Government is the creature of the City. Watch when they are thrown out of office how these Labour ministers walk into lucrative sinecures with investment banks etc, just like T.Blair with his few days "work" for Morgans at a million plus.

billericay dave

So you work hard save for your childrens future and what happens liebour tax you to death now there is a great incentive to make something of your life, I work hard for my family and myself not for others to sponge of me. Liebor as usual tax the hard working people of britain to pay for the looney socialist ideal which works great till you run out of other peoples money. Dragging everyone down to the lowest level doesnt work, how many more times have we got to see liebour destroy the economy just so they can say we made life a little fairer. Life isnt fair you get out what you put in.

Major Plonquer

"The problem with socialist governments", said Margaret Thatcher, "is that they always run out of other people's money".

john miller

I am minded of the 10% tax band again.

Watching the Budget, I was surprised when Brown announced the abolition of that rate and when later became the fist Labour chancellor to reduce the basic rate of tax.

It was really rather obvious who was going to suffer from this arrangement, yet the Labour benches went wild with delight, Blair gave his mindless grin and squeezed Gordon's arm. (This was re-written in true Labour style and socialist history now tells us Blair was deeply concerned about his Chancellor's Budget).

It took about 9 long months for MPs of all parties to realise what the budget actually had meant for low earners.

In the same way, you get the impression that MPs don't realise the amount of debt UK plc has taken on.

Darling is now bleating on about slowing of the rate of increase in public expenditure (!) but I suppose this shows he has a vague idea of the state of the economy.

For Cruddas to make these proposals is astounding. Either he is delusional or he thinks Labour supporters are mentally deficient.

Sadly, I, of course, believe both to be true. He and his supporters genuinely don't understand the situation the country is in.

Unfortunately for Cameron, they may never do so. The horrible events that will occur by 2015 will be spun as being solely caused by the nasty, incompetent Tories.

And Mr Cruddas and his supporters will believe this with every fibre of their being.

Cameron & Co must now lay off Brown, who is a dead man walking anyway. Instead they must attack the Labour Party as a whole, using examples such as Cruddas, to illustrate to the electorate that the party in power has wrecked the economy and has no real comprehension of the exentof the damage. If he does not succeed he will have one short term in office followed by political extinction.

mitch

Knowing you will never have to deliver must be very liberating.

John Lea

erm, just to add some balance: what exactly do the tories stand for anymore?

IH

"the policies Cruddas is proposing do not seem to acknowledge the state of the public finances"

Which says it all.

simon s

Where did Crappass send his son to school? A school even posher than the London Oratory - Cardinal Vaughn just off Kensington High Street.

And yet Crappass popped up on a documentary saying how important it was for schools to respect their pupils working class culture. No Jon - working class pupils need what good Catholic schools give - a healthy dose of discipline and aspiration.

wonderfulforhisage

John Lea 8:30.

For goodness sake, do try and keep up. The Heir to Blair is in charge. Answer your own question. All you've got to do is have a look at Blair's '97 manifesto. Education, education, education and all that malarkey.

fox in a box

John Lea.

Fiscal responsibility.

Yup, get's my vote...

Chris lancashire

Cruddas - yet another champagne socialist who can run our lives for us and spend our money better than we can ourselves. And (check the bio) never actually done a job where you have to earn money as opposed to spending it.

Michael Booth

"The Cruddas Intervention" sounds like a film title... who would play Brown, I wonder?

MrJones

He's positioning for afterwards imo. If he gets too involved before the next election he'll be tainted.

The policy stuff is for internal Labour party marketing, not actual policy.

John Lea

wonderfulforhisage - yes, that and hanging out with dodgy billionaire Russian oligarchs on their mediterranean yacht. Ok, to be fair, that was George Osborne, but I wouldn't be surprised to see Dave spending his summers at Silvio Berlusconi's pad in Tuscany - after he's elected of course.

kein

you see that picture in your caption and you hear him saying "taxi for labour" and then "yes that's right there is four of us".justcan't wait till push comes to shove.

Gordon Kennedy

Am I hearing right?

'The Emperors of Spin', says everyone else has no clothes? If only Labour ring the changes and find one more experimental theory to get behind, then Leftwing MPs keep their jobs?

No!!!.....I am surprised that Mr Jon Cruddas MP is pointing the finger at Labour for the lack of substance, as if his career so closely associated with Downing Street never happened.

I thought it was the likes of him working with Tony Blair, that brought us to this point in the first place, not Gordon Brown who took over the reign in the last tragic furlong.

And now the principal architects of failure, say.... 'Nuffink to do with me Guv!

The voters have now realised, that all along it was just an anxious parade of empty promises without proper plans, to squeeze past the latest scandal into the next election.

Don't ask for whom the bell tolls Jon Cruddas...

Gordon Kennedy