It’s unfair to say Brown “won” PMQs because Cameron decided not to play. There was a distinct air of national crisis to PMQs which, of course, helps Gordon Brown. Few amongst us would be so bold as to think the taxpayer will see this £50 billion again, but David Cameron was not going to point this out. His problem through all of this is an inability to say what he’d do differently. The rating of leaders rises during wartime, fear heightens collectivist instincts so this all benefits Brown. His mission is to talk up this idea of an economic war – but at the moment he doesn’t need much help. Funny that the US Congress was in revolt over the Paulson bailout plan – taxpayers’ money bailing out bankers etc – but hardly a peep from our lot.
Cameron ran the other way, speaking like a Labour backbencher asking him if he agrees that the banking system cannot be allowed to fail. “I hope we can proceed now on the basis that there will be all-party support for the actions that have been taken today and will be taken in future days”. ie, no more opposition from you, sunny. Game set and match to the Brown. Time for you all to rally behind the Dear Leader – Tories and all!
As Cameron expressed support, Brown twice declared himself “grateful for the chance to explain” and went on to give a technical speech about “small and medium-sized enterprises” A reminder that his great weakness is jargon. The way to beat him, as Vince Cable knows, is to fight is jargon with clear language. Brown was trying to say he’s stopped the bank bonuses and fat cat pay as a result of the bailout. The “excessive risk-taking which has caused so much damage”. What about the risks of running up a deficit of 3% of GDP in the good times, as he did, thinking he’d abolished boom and bust? This is what grates me about Brown. He turned the debt tap on. He caused the damage – which is why the IMF says Britain will be amongst the worst-hit countries in the world by the downturn. He was as addicted to his stamp duty income as City traders were to their bonuses. I’d like to argue that now’s the time to fix the problem, and fixing the blame will come later. But it’s entirely possible that Brown will get away with it.
Ah, Nick Clegg. After all those weeks of recess, you almost forget he existed. “When a ship of sinking, you send out lifeboats. You don’t argue about who steered it into an iceberg.” Good analogy – and I could have heard plenty more references into asking just why there is so much bad debt in the economy. Who turned the tap on.
Angela Watkinson says “Does the PM share my disgust that some banks are charging small businesses 15% on their overdraft”. This is exactly the problem Brown is now in: if the government is partially subsidising the banking industry, it will be under pressure to curb the uglier side of the industry such as charging very high interest rates to the clients with a high risk of defaulting. I remember a poster once at a Labour Party conference asking “why do the poor pay higher rates of interest” and thinking “because they have a worse credit rating”. The mismatch between political and economic logic has the potential to cause much chaos in the banking system. Gavin Strang wanted banks to “show a bit of courage” and return to “normal lending” – there was nothing normal about the last ten years of lending.
Brown talks about a “global early warning system that we in Britain have tried for for years”. The IMF was warning Brown for years that his spree would end in tears and he ignored their warnings as I blogged here.
Word is it was Mandelson who gave Brown the line “no time for a novice” and if The Prince was advising him here, it worked. Brown’s narrative is that this whole problem was created either by America, or by bankers’ bonus. And who turned the debt taps on? Who filled an economy choc full of debt, on terms the banks are now finding is unsustainable? Who mislabelled it “prosperity”? Not questions anyone is asking. Two weeks ago, I said that Brown was not an economic genius, but had a genius in getting away with so much, for so long. I was wrong to use the past tense. The genius is still there.
Comments