Ed Balls so badly wants the Government to fail, he can't even celebrate Britain's successes

By Mark Wallace
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The other day I picked out an example of Labour's miserablism:

"Ed Balls' apparent enthusiasm when the economic data is poor, and his deflation when the figures improve"

It's a sad fact that Balls can barely contain his desire for things to go wrong in the economy so that he can promote himself on the back of a crisis.

Given the howls that suggestion generates from some quarters, I now owe a debt of gratitude to the Shadow Chancellor himself for proving the point.

Here he is yesterday on the BBC News Channel discussing the latest economic figures:

Given that the ONS had just revised the GDP figures upwards, he might at least have ditched the frown for one day. More remarkable was his assertion that:

"The export performance has been woeful..."

Compare and contrast that claim with the headlines from last night's Evening Standard:

That's right, exports grew by 3.6 per cent, no small feat when the Eurozone has been languishing in the doldrums.

Balls should probably have noticed he'd taken his professional grump too far when even the BBC were being more positive about the economy than him. 

Perhaps we should have a competition, with a prize for the first person to spot Ed Balls celebrating economic good news?