A Labour leadership candidate needs to take on Balls over spending – and quick

Rhoda Klapp

You do not seem to realise that to this reader and many others, the fact that Finkelstein agrees with your point does not enhance your argument, rather the reverse. You'd be better advised to conceal the fact if you wish to convince anybody.

SUSAN HILL

He is speaking not to the nation but to the party faithful and they simply have their heads in the sand and do not believe there is anything wrong with our finances. Either they are too stupid or they are wilfully ignoring facts and figures. Balls wants them to vote for him. At the moment he doesn`t care about the rest of us.
This needs a TV debate, with someone who does have all the figures at his fingertips to confront Balls-up with them one by one and demand answers. If we do not get that - and don`t hold your breath - then Balls can lie and spin and evade and his party friends will believe him. Investment versus Cuts is a very clever line to take.

AF

They wish to air brush it out of sight,
as if they had no connection with the appalling state they have left this nation,
they must be reminded of the part they played at every opportunity.

Naomi Muse

Give them all time.

Some of them who were not members of the cabinet and the Brown cabal, will mention the overspending, the lack of cabinet government over which they agonised, and the bullying problem which caused the lack of a candidate to stand against Brown, after Blair's 'the end' departure.

It will come out when the list becomes clearer. At the moment they are only chucking their hats into the ring.

Robert Eve

Bals is a bigger joke than Clegg.

Annabel Herriott

It's just a damn shame that Anthony Calvert did'nt take his seat from him! The man is a liability.

Liz Brown

For any of the candidates to talk about the deficit is to admit that the economic policies of the last Government, of which they are all members, is to expose themselves to the accusation that they were collectively responsible for the disaster that is the UK deficit run up by them. None of them is capable of mea culpa. They are far too busy "listening"

Robert Taggart

The d-word = Denial !
This be "the hate that dare not speak its name" !

sinosimon

but balls can never do anything else. the prime mentalist had a back of the fag packet grasp of economics......his much vaunted phd was in the history of the labour party in scotland. despite the fact that most of the oprobrium is poured on the head of brown, the detail, nuts and bolts of the fiscal disaster we now face are all down to one man.......young eddie.

as the last election showed, the labour party can rely on roughly one third of the country no matter what. people so ignorant, or wrapped up in class hatred, that irrespetive of what they do, they will vote labour.

we should pray for ed to romp to victory, so his swivel eyed lunacy at least keeps the other 70% safely away from the socialists at the voting booth.

Tim Carpenter LPUK

It is not a Labour candidate that needs to take this misinformation on, but the Government.

The message should not be about "cuts" but what would happen without them.

londonerr

I'm not surprised at all. Spending money IS the solution for this lot.

A Griffin

That 'struggling to contain his glee' phrase is very similar to liam Byrnes pre-election phrase 'the Tories are salivating over cuts' which he said on Question Time and in the House of Commons during the budget debate.
You can imagine them all sitting in the Treasury thinking up like phrases to pour all over the Conservatives. Don't they realise that nice guys finish first now?
This is typical labour smear from the old thrown out government because they can't evolve with changing times.
Labour need a fresh start with sane people such as Tom Harris, Diane Abbot, Frank Field etc. not back to the future with these nasties.

Chris lancashire

I agree entirely that the financially moronic Balls needs to be challenged on the defecit. However, it has to be said that no party in the run up to the election honestly addressed the situation. As a result of that the majority of the public thinks it isn't too bad or the problem has somehow gone away. It is to be hoped that the June Budget is completely clear on the scale of the problem and how it is to be tackled.

Gareth

The problem is that the Tories never managed to pin any clear blame on the last lot for the defecit. That whole 'global recession' and lying through their teeth seemed to work with the electorate. Can you IMAGINE the stink Gordon Brown would have kicked up if it had been the Tories who overspent when we were in surplus and brought the country's finances to its knees. We'd never have heard the last of it and the message would have stuck.

Duncan

Surely from a Tory perspective, the best outcome would be for Balls to win the Labour leadership? He epitomises why Labour lost the last election. He only wants to create dividing lines, rather than consider what is best for the country as a whole. He is an even more unpleasant version of Gordon Brown, and appears to be loathed by many in his own party, and not just by the public. Brown's economic policies were Balls' economic policies, and he will therefore always be linked to the economic disaster which the last Labour government contributed to in a major way.

HJ

I'm all for Balls as Labour leader.

His leadership would ensure that the Labour vote is even lower at the next election.

Moraymint

Only when a critical mass of UK citizens feels the full effects of the actions needed to recover from 13 years of Labour government, will people like Balls be forced to confront reality (and even then I shan't hold my breath).

At the moment, we continue to live in a phoney, post-Labour financial environment. However, there is now so much pent up grief in the economy, that when that grief is eventually (soon) transferred to individuals, families and businesses there's going to be all sorts of ramifications.

The scariest thing about all this is that people like Balls peddle such dangerous nonsense at all. Balls' motives are beyond contempt. It's a shame that he gets any traction at all.

Bistodrinker

Just about sums Ed Balls up. One day he will have to face up to the truthhis and his cohorts profligate spending has reduced the economy to that of a third world nation. Still we can all tighten our belts a bit more can't we !!

Thomas Cussans

It really doesn't what Balls this about the deficit or any other subject. This is not just because it will naturally be a mendacious pile of pooh but because he has no more chance of becoming Labour leader than my dead granny.

Vulture

Balls should not be combatted - his leadership bid should be backed by every right-thinking citizen.

For with him in charge, the Liebour party will die - and not before time.

Vote Balls - and make the cock-up complete.

PayDirt

The message to take from Labour's silence on the deficit/debt is that they don't care about inflation. They would continue to print money to fund their spending plans and call the foreign exchange markets bluff.

Simon Stephenson

"Now, you could say that this doesn't matter – Balls is stuck on the sidelines now, so his scaremongering won't take root. But my view is that the fiscal situation will require an open, expansive and considered debate, by all sides, over the course of years if not decades."

I agree, but the focus of the debate must be at the raison d'être level for both sides. At the moment the "right" is presenting its case from the point of view that the market is governed by laws that politics cannot change, and that therefore it is the task of politicians to structure policies that respect these laws. Hence, however painful, cuts must be made, because "no cuts" will be even more painful.

The centre-left, on the other hand, does not believe that politics must be conducted in a way that is subordinate to the market's laws. It sees these laws as essentially human constructions that are fixed only for so long as thought patterns consider them to be fixed. It suggests that interested parties may have made safe havens too safe, and that it is within the scope of politicians to change this ... even going so far as to advise that, as representatives of the entire people, it is their duty to do this. Hence, beware that the clamour for cuts may be an over-reaction to pressure by the market more designed to protect the status quo than to act unambiguously in the total human interest.

Andrew Zalotocky

None of the candidates for Labour leader can risk talking about the deficit. If they do they will be asked why they didn't do something about it while they were in office, and what they intend to do about it now.

None of them can answer the first question with any credibility and attempting to do so will only remind the public of their culpability. They can't answer the second question without proposing spending cuts that will alienate the unions and Labour's public sector payroll vote. They have to pretend that the problem doesn't exist.

David Bouvier

I suppose we have to rely on the good sense of the voting public to again consign Labour to opposition for a decade to learn this lesson again.

ex-agent

If this is anything to go by, he doesn't have a hope.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00sccf2/PM_19_05_2010/

The interview with Eddie Mair starts about 51 minutes in.

michael

Labour are still in denial.... Just look at how those greedy Tory types have led us up the garden path.

Richard of York

Forget about Balls for the moment. What are this shower doing about the economy? The pound has crashed ..soon to drop below $1.40 the FTSE is at its lowest since 2008 under 5000.
Cameron is on a Ryanair capital breaks long weekend and the rest of the cabal are still pushing buttons on the electric windows of the new cars.
Everything has been put on hold while the Liberal conservatives tidy up the stationary cupboards.
When is someone going to fix my broken society?
Only person who seems to be doing anything on the political front is Diane Abbott giving the journos a laugh.
What about the announcement promised today on the £6bn cuts for this year......seems it is not as important as Tory backbenchers venting sniffiness over being shafted by the great leader in a coup from the strangers bar.
Getting very bored watching Fraser trying to be all things to all men from one studio to the next.
Come on Speccies it's time you called your team out of the locker room.

ollie

" But my view is that the fiscal situation will require an open, expansive and considered debate,"

And how exactly does this tie in with the Labour party, the authors of the dire situation we find ourselves in?

alexsandr

Can someone explain to me how an MP from a very marginal constituency can become leader.
What happens if the leader loses his seat at a GE?

AF

alexsandr,
they would shamefully parachute the oaf into a safe seat,having first sent some old fart to the Lords.

Victor Southern

The country appeared to be OK with Labour's endless failed initiatives until Brown took over from Blair. Brown is an essentially unpleasant man with a bullying manner. That sunk Labour. Balls is an essentially unpleasant man with a bullying manner. That may suit the Labour party but fortunately the remaining electorate will never warm to Balls.

Simon Stephenson

alexsandr : 12.54pm

"Can someone explain to me how an MP from a very marginal constituency can become leader. What happens if the leader loses his seat at a GE?"

This one's being doing the rounds for too long now, and needs to be knocked on the head. In slightly less graphic terms than AF's, the reality is that if Labour want Balls as leader, then they'll find him a more secure constituency to stand for next time round. Being MP for a marginal constituency is, quite rightly, no disqualification at all to someone becoming leader of his Party, should this be what his Party desires.

Skippy

"I believe Labour’s secret weapon will be our ability and willingness to listen."

HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!

Simon Stephenson

Naomi Muse : 9.59am

"Some of them who were not members of the cabinet and the Brown cabal, will mention the overspending, the lack of cabinet government over which they agonised, and the bullying problem which caused the lack of a candidate to stand against Brown, after Blair's 'the end' departure."

Yes, there will probably be some who see this as a tactical move to win back electability. But I can assure you that no genuinely radical politician is going to accept the permanency of playing second-fiddle to the interests that control the "laws" of the financial markets.

And no more should they. Let's have a proper political contest rather than another of the endless stream of side-issue skirmishes by two sides reluctant to put their central ideology to the test.

TrevorsDen

You really expect a candidate for the LABOUR leadership and.or the LABOUR electoral college to care about the deficit. 'Not us guv, nothing to do with us. All the cuts are tory cuts not ours.'

They will airbrush their culpability out.

Frank Sutton

But my view is that the fiscal situation will require an open, expansive and considered debate
But why should the Labour party, under Balls or anyone else, have a voice in this debate?
Their place is, if anywhere, in the dock - supposing the court of public opinion has dock.

2trueblue

WE need Balls to win. This would put him i the spotlight and display what he really is.

Kennybhoy

Victor Southern wrote:

"The country appeared to be OK with Labour's endless failed initiatives until Brown took over from Blair."

An extremely important point. While we here in our Wingnut echo chamber look back on thirteen years of misrule, the GBP see only two to three years of such.

TGF UKIP

So Ed on the deficit is rather like Dave on immigration - or Europe!

Snowman

Be careful, you may get what you are wishing for. The guy may be all the things you say he is, but one would be hard put to deny he’s a ruthless schemer, and clever, too. If his Charlie mate can get the unions backing him, he’ll have a formidable force that will come handy as the two boys in charge begin to dish out the bad news. And more to the point, neither he nor the other candidates have to address the issue of cuts. They aren’t running the show, they can wait. For the coalition to survive for as long as possible, we need a Labour leader incapable of harnessing the power of the unions, I reckon.

Victor Southern at 1.52:

The country was quite content with Brown and 'the endless failed initiatives' after he took over, have you forgotten that their poll rating got boosted. The country turned against him after the money ceased to be plentiful and cheap.

H Black

Balls up for Labour leader - hoorah. Doubt whether 33 MPs are mug enough to back him - boo.

Frank Leader

If Balls becomes the next Leader of the Labour Party. The members will probably be expressing their opinion of the previous two. Blair and Brown, BALLS.