Ed Balls
Lord Mandelson gives Miliband two big tasks
There is always something quietly devastating about a pronouncement from Lord Mandelson. Today more polls reveal the Labour party is failing to make headway when the Tories are in an… Continue reading
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Peter Hain wants more debt — another policy stolen from the Tories
Peter Hain is pessimistic about Ed Miliband’s chances, in spite of what the bookies say*. ‘If a general election was held tomorrow, Labour wouldn’t win a majority,’ he writes in… Continue reading
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Labour is being forced to talk about ‘good borrowing’ before it is ready
It’s not a case of will they, won’t they when it comes to whether Labour would borrow more, but will they admit it and try to sell this plan to… Continue reading
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At home with the Balls family
Do you recall The Politician’s Wife by Paula Milne? It was a TV drama that aired in the dying days of the Major government. Milne recognised that Major’s government was more… Continue reading
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What will Ed Miliband do on spending?
The political mood has shifted these past few weeks. There’s now, as the Sunday papers demonstrate, far more focus on Labour than there was a couple of months back, something… Continue reading
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Ed Miliband needs to talk about 2015, not what he would do now
Ed Miliband’s speech to the Scottish Labour conference is another illustration that he intends to depict ‘One Nation Labour’ as the answer to so-called Tory divisiveness. Miliband told the conference:… Continue reading
25 Comments
‘Would you like to replace Ed Balls?’ The question Alistair Darling won’t answer
Ed Balls is a good street fighter, but not a very loveable one. The polls suggest he is perhaps the least popular figure in frontline politics. His manner too abrasive… Continue reading
34 Comments
Budget 2013: The public’s verdict
We’ve got the first post-Budget polling from YouGov, and it brings mixed news for George Osborne. Certainly, this Budget doesn’t seem (so far) to have dented the Chancellor’s reputation the… Continue reading
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Budget 2013: Ed Balls sticks to his favourite 50p attack
Ed Balls has just given his post-Budget briefing in parliament. The striking thing about Balls, no matter how much you might disagree with him, is how much he relishes these… Continue reading
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Tories and Lib Dems strike deal on mansion tax vote
Further to Isabel’s post this morning, I understand from a senior coalition source that the two parties have now reached an agreement on how to handle Tuesday’s vote on Labour’s… Continue reading
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Why Ed Balls isn’t being more upfront about his borrowing plans
No matter how bad the economic news, government ministers can always take heart that an attack from Labour will always be blunted by the simple line that ‘Labour would borrow… Continue reading
90 Comments
AAA credit rating: George Osborne gives Labour a (revisionist) history lesson
George Osborne was playing historian today as he responded to Ed Balls’ urgent question on the credit rating downgrade, charting Labour’s role in the UK’s loss of the AAA rating;… Continue reading
30 Comments
Reagan, Keynes, Question Time and tax cuts
I was on the panel of BBC Question Time this evening, in Leicester. Ed Balls’ tricksy 10p tax proposal was raised, and I raised my reservation: it does very little… Continue reading
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Ed Balls reverses over his own progress on fiscal responsibility
The battle-lines over the Welfare Benefits Up-rating Bill — which faces its second reading in the Commons this afternoon — have been drawn. Labour has tied its opposition to the… Continue reading
35 Comments
Labour revisits old welfare ghosts with its jobs guarantee
Dig out the bunting, fly the red flags in celebration, for finally we have a policy from the Labour party. Ed Miliband promised that 2013 would be the year he’d… Continue reading
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Ed Balls says Labour will oppose the Welfare Uprating Bill
Ed Balls gave the clearest indication yet today that his party would vote against the government’s plans to cap benefit rises to 1 per cent rather than in line with… Continue reading
32 Comments
The public’s verdict on the Autumn Statement
We’ve only had two days to digest it, but the early signs from YouGov are that George Osborne’s Autumn Statement has gone down a lot better than his March Budget.… Continue reading
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Miliband’s false ‘millionaires’ tax cut’ attack
Messrs Miliband and Balls performed their pre-autumn statement double act today. If for some inexplicable reason you missed it, the Labour chiefs launched their Q&A with an attack on the government… Continue reading
56 Comments
How will Tory whips respond to Ed Balls’ audacious petrol vote?
Ed Balls has secured a debate for next week calling for the government to postpone for a second time the 3p rise in fuel duty that is due this January.… Continue reading
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Why David Cameron isn’t proposing a cut in the EU budget
Cutting the EU budget is a very good idea. Much of it is spent inefficiently and its priorities are all wrong, 40 percent of it goes on agriculture. Given that… Continue reading
34 Comments