Matthew Hancock-Mp

Balls’ shrill attack on King

Ed Balls’ irresponsible attack on Mervyn King is a clearly calculated attempt to undermine the Bank of England for Balls’ own narrow political ends. Balls both approved Mervyn King’s appointment and supported King as Governor when he was Chief Economic Adviser to the Treasury. Balls was central to creating the record deficit left by Labour, yet who has no plan for clearing the mess up.

Now he is attacking the Governor of the Bank of England for supporting the Government’s plan to deal with the deficit. In what way is it political for the Governor to support the Government? I’d say that’s deeply non-political.

By contrast, to play narrow party politics with the Governor’s position in the way Balls is doing today shows how desperate Labour has become. Is he also going to attack the IMF, OECD, European Commission, and G20 which all agree that action is needed to deal with the appalling deficit he left?

Increasingly, there is a pattern here. Balls takes positions he knows not to be true, like the ridiculous claim that taxes on banks are falling when in fact they are going up. He then hammers the point in the hope that by repetition he can make it true. It’s just what Brown did in office. But critically it undermines his own credibility. To attempt to undermine the Bank at such a critical time for the economy is a dangerous mistake.

£14bn of Darling’s cuts would have started in six weeks time, only £2 billion less than the Coalition plan. If Balls wants to enter the debate with any credibility he should first accept his culpability for the deficit he left, and set out his own plan instead of playing desperate political games.

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