Over at Conservative Home, Jonathan Isaby flags up George Osborne’s response to some of today’s gloomy economic and financial indicators. Here are the shadow chancellor’s words:
“First we discovered that there were fewer shoppers in December despite the VAT cut, now we discover house prices are falling sharply and mortgage approvals at a record low despite the stamp duty holiday introduced three months ago.
The new year shows that Gordon Brown’s policies are not working and the recession is getting worse not better. That is because an economic recovery depends on confidence in the future, and people do not have that confidence while we have a Labour Government in power bankrupting the country.”You’d better get used to this “Gordon Brown’s policies are not working” message, as I imagine it will form the basis of almost every Tory attack over the forthcoming year. Politically, the Tories’ greatest boon in 2009 is the fact that the economy will continue sinking, and the £billions of taxpayers’ cash that Gordon Brown has flung at the problem can thereby be characterised as waste.
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