George Osborne's PBR response

Visibly angry George Osborne gets up. Highlights follow, not verbatim.

The Prime Minister's claim to have abolished boom and bust is shown to be rubbish. A national debt built up over decades has been doubled in five years.

All Labour Chancellors run out of money. All Labour governments bring the country to the edge of bankruptcy. Prudence is dead. Labour has done it again.

Tax giveaways for Christmas. Tax rises for life.

Like the gambler who can't give up he thinks he can borrow himself out of trouble.

It's total nonsense to blame America for the biggest housing boom in the world or the largest budget deficit in the developed world?

Brown never prepared Britain for the bust.

Britain's recession will be worse than almost any other developed country in the world. Brown built growth on debt, a housing boom and bigger government. He did not fix the roof when the sun was shining.

Borrowing money to finance lower prices when prices are already falling doesn't make sense.

Higher taxes on high earners only fills 5% of the Chancellor's black hole. It distracts from the big tax rises that are coming for middle earners. The rise in National Insurance is not so much a bombshell but a precision-guided missile aimed at the middle classes and the recovery.

You cannot spend your way out of recession.  Japan could not.  Britain cannot.

The responsible course would have been to control borrowing and to get credit moving for the real economy.

This is the worst public policy failure for a generation.  The national debt doubled.  The recession in Britain set to be the worst in the developed world.  Large permanent tax rises set to follow temporary tax cuts announced today.  Only the Conservatives will restore fiscal sanity to Britain.

ENDS.

Comments

[H Taylor]

An immature welter of slogans from Osborne so far with no indication that he has a grasp of the seriousness of the economic crisis. Political point scoring business as usual which is such a turn off for voters such as myself.

[NigelC]

We need to get angry with Brown, he has wrecked our country!

[Big Jock Knew]

H Taylor - a "floating voter " eh ?

[Andrew Woodman]

Good performance by Osborne this.

[John]

"An immature welter of slogans from Osborne so far with no indication that he has a grasp of the seriousness of the economic crisis. Political point scoring business as usual which is such a turn off for voters such as myself."

I understand the severity of the Labour screw up - maybe people might listen!

[Sean Fear]

H Taylor - a "floating voter " eh ?

Actually, I'm surprised he hasn't stated on "I was a Conservative supporter until I heard Osborne............." line.

[John]

Darling and Brown - scorched earth??

[Mike]

Osborne doing very well.

[rgt247]

Near seen Osborne so angry !

[Western Star]

Great performance from George - he's good when he is angry!

[James H]

Thumbs up for Osborne!

[Miranda]

H Taylor

Your comment is quite unbelieveable, and of the worst 'troll' kind ie we can see right through it.

It is Brown who is doing everything for party politics.
It is Brown who has no grasp of economics.
It is Brown who has his soundbites all lined up to lie to us. He cannot tell the truth anymore.

You would not vote Conservative if they were the only party to vote for. You are quite despicable, you and your kind have runied so many people's lives.

George Osbourne is angry like the rest of us; all of us understand the seriousness of our situation, far, far more than you do - earning your piece rates for spouting your lying comments. Paid for lying - does that feel good?

[meli]

Superb speech by George.

[resident leftie]

Osborne read out his notes effectively, but he needs some voice coaching. He sounds like an adenoidal sixth form debater.

[AngryVoter]

An excellent responce from Osbourne, used a number of responces very well. I can see folks swinging back behind Osbourne after this PBR performance.

Wonder where all those "RON's" have gone?

Comitted Sepkku with any luck from straying from the party line...

[Letters From A Tory]

Ouch. Brown and Darling clearly felt that and the Labour front bench looked seriously depressed as Osborne let rip.

I think the newspapers tomorrow will be a lot kinder to Osborne than to Darling.

[Mike]

Hopefully the dissenters will shut up and we can get on with the job of taking this government apart.

Interesting to see so many of Osbourne's ideas in the PBR.

Government, totally clueless... no way anyone can spin that. It's a shambles.

[Happy Tory]

George is right to be angry. We're all angry.

1997-2008: The Ostrich Years.
The head in the sand years when Gordon Brown got us into this mess. Why on earth should any of us trust his judgement? He has not earned even a shred of trust from us. Quite the reverse. He has demonstrated conclusively how utterly poor his judgement is. He deserves not the slightest hint of benefit of the doubt. He deserves our anger.

[pp]

Osborne - the right man for the job.

Darling - like brown - can't answer a single question, doesn't care about the country or the public, just about slagging off the tories -- particularly pathetic.

[Clive Elliot]

A really excellent speech by Osbourne in response to a very complex and incompletely described series of measures from the Chancellor.

Such a huge input of borrowed cash from the Government is bound to make the Government seem better, and the only hope for us is that we can persuade the prople that it's all going to have to be paid back in the end (after the election), plus interest.

A first-class job by Osbourne is starting this process off.

[Michael McGowan]

The proposed borrowing figures are off the scale. And this assumes that they are telling the truth. Makes Labour in the seventies look thrifty. No doubt resident leftie can offer us some delusional observations about how thing ar all hunky dory in Rekjavik on Thames.

[DJT]

"Osborne read out his notes effectively, but he needs some voice coaching. He sounds like an adenoidal sixth form debater."

Yes because that's what is important here isnt it...We're talking about borrowing numbers i cant beleive!...But No lets focus on who has the most entertaining voice!

Anyhow...Welcome back Old Labour! Seems the only chance i now have of buying a house (as a 24 year old Masters graduate with a decent job) is to become unemployed and have myself 5 kids! Its very fair life under Labour isn't it!

[Western Star]

H Taylor and Resident Leftie -Nice try and all that, but you can't spin it your way this time I'm afraid! Osborne's performance was magnificent and he expressed the anger we ALL feel.... Bring on the Election - bring it on NOW!

[rationality]

an electrifying performance from George. A taste of things to come I hope.

I'm convinced the press will see this for what it was- Darling's two faced bribes being thrown back in his face.

[Dorian Caterpilla]

The last time we were in a Labour induced meltdown in the 1970s we had a Labour chancellor with bizarre eyebrows. Good old Dennis.

Now, in the naughties in a similar about to call in the IMF type collapse, we have a Labour chancellor with equally ludicrous forehead fuzz.

Warning. You know a recession is coming if your chancellor has eyebrows like a brace of guardsman’s busbies.

[bill]

"Sharing the proceeds of growth": funny if not tragic. If Osborne and Cameron had done a half decent job of opposing New Labour their criticism might have some traction in middle England, particularly amongst those of us who saw this disaster coming before Cameron was even on anyone's radar.

[Old Hack]

Osborne punched some good points which should feature in the news bulletins. Some of his speech was a bit hurried though, which was a shame.

In all, not bad. Has he done enough? I'm not sure, but I'm more hopeful than I was.

On to the spin war - the most critical battle.

[Mike]

For you Labour supporters posting here, could you explain to me where the 'stimulus' was in this supposed 'stimulus package'?

Also, when it fails to have the desired effect what is plan 'B'?

More borrowing perchance?

A tinkering package of measures bought at great cost and completely shown up for what it is by Osborne.

[CJT]

Better performance by Osborne. Darling had at least the grace to rush through the downright fibs. Crtics must remember that, in spite of the trailers, Osborne got to hear Darling's speech live as we did - so his response is inevitably extempore. [email protected] is right, though. This crisis has been on the cards for ages if only because of the record amounts of borrowing both public and private that have caused it.

[Rod Sellers]

Missed the speech live by Osbourne but reading it, he focussed on the central fact - Brown and Labour have squandered a legacy - racked up debt and now have put us all in hock to pay for it. None of the other froth matters.

Anyone who buys this as responsible policy should be sectioned.

Brown said he would do whatever it takes - and boy, have we been taken.

[griswold]

Osborne brilliant.

He should have just added a sentence or two directed to the public to counter Mandelson/Campbell's propaganda lines of spin fed through the talking head Darling.

"We respect the British people's intelligence and will not deceive them with platitudes, weasel words, and hollow promises etc ....We value truth above spin etc..."

[bexie]

Gordo

The credit card chancellor and the plundering prime minister.

he will go down as one of the most incompetent politicians ever on record.

[Cleethorpes Rock]

I suppose Darling thinks that in the light of his VAT reduction, budget store Poundland will have to rename itself 97.87p-land?

[resident leftie]

Posted by: DJT | November 24, 2008 at 16:47

"Osborne read out his notes effectively, but he needs some voice coaching. He sounds like an adenoidal sixth form debater."

Yes because that's what is important here isnt it...We're talking about borrowing numbers i cant beleive!...But No lets focus on who has the most entertaining voice!

Oh, we'll get to the analysis when we here the Osborne's proposals. But, this is a political site, and that's the prime focus of this thread.

As a matter of interest, I find Darling's voice soporific.

Posted by: Western Star | November 24, 2008 at 16:48

H Taylor and Resident Leftie -Nice try and all that, but you can't spin it your way this time I'm afraid! Osborne's performance was magnificent and he expressed the anger we ALL feel.... Bring on the Election - bring it on NOW!

I'm pleased for you that you are so fired up. I do think this is Osborne's best performance in the House. Calls to dismiss him should subside. But, like Thatcher, he needs a bit of help with his voice.

To contrast, I perked up immediately when Ken Clarke spoke.

[Matt Wright]

Good work Osbourne. It's time Labour were chucked out before they do any further damage.

[James Maskell]

Well, that decides it, with taxation to be so high in the future, there goes any chance of ever retiring...

I dont benefit at all from tax credits or pension support and get no financial support from the Government, and yet I have to cough up 0.5% extra in National Insurance to pay not for healthcare which surely is the point of NI but for a reccession I had no part in causing.

Everyone getting on hands and knees, also known as the British taxpayer position...