Bloggers might enjoy this exchange on economic and political history between myself and Lord Brooke following the statement on the Financial Forecast: http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld201011/ldhansrd/text/101129-0001.htm#10112928000194
Lord Soley: The noble Lord might consider recommending to the Chancellor of the Exchequer that this Statement be submitted for the Booker Prize for creative literature. It really is rather strange. In repeating the Statement, the Minister said that some people said that these growth figures would not happen. That is not true. They said that they would happen as long as we did not cut too deeply or too fast. That is what the previous Government said. The growth figures in the first seven months of this Government are down to the previous Government’s policies and the general policies within industry. The Minister might care to remember-as I pointed out a number of times when I was sat on that side of the House-that British manufacturing output was growing and that we were the sixth largest manufacturing country in the world. At the same time, French manufacturing was in decline. At the same time, President Sarkozy has expressed concern that the French might have trouble with their triple A rating.
It is also not true to say that this is the largest deficit in peacetime history. Simply typing “history of the national debt” into any search engine, or going to the library, will tell him that national debt in peacetime, as a percentage of GDP, was significantly higher through most of the 19th century-it was the way we financed the Empire-and much of the 20th century. Indeed, it was only the previous Labour Government who paid off the final debt from the Napoleonic wars and the Second World War. Can the Minister now tell us why he thinks that cutting faster and deeper in the coming year will help when we are already recovering? In a year’s time he will not be able to carry on the political, or party propaganda, line that somehow or other in seven months the Government have turned it round. They have not. That was already happening. What matters is the next 12 months.
Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville: My Lords, while enjoying the historical intervention of the noble Lord, Lord Soley, does my noble friend recall the remark of the Leader of the House in the wind-up to the Queen’s Speech debate of 1951 when he said that all incoming Governments find skeletons in the closet, but his Government had found them swinging from the chandeliers? Secondly, does he recall the conduct of Mr Butler’s economic policy between 1951 and 1955? Finally, does he remember that at the 1955 general election the Conservatives tripled their majority?
What matter in the historical perspective of debt is the nature of the equity that underpinned the borrowing; I believe this was gold. If the government is in a hurry to lower borrowing it suggests that the equity base for that borrowing is not as secure as it once was?
“The largest deficit in peacetime history.”
” National debt in peacetime, as a percentage of GDP, was significantly higher through most of the 19th century”
Which part from 1800-1808 ?
The Peninsular War 1808 to 1814:
Vimeiro, Corunna, Douro, Talavera, Busaco, Barossa, Fuentes de Onoro, Albuera, Salamanca and Vitoria.
The Napoleonic Wars 1802 to 1814:
Trafalgar and Quatre Bras.
THE BATTLE OF WATERLOO 1815.
The First Afghan War 1839 to 1842:
Ghuznee, Kabul and Gandamak, Jellalabad and Kabul 1842.
The Crimean War 1854 to 1856:
Alma, Balaclava, Inkerman and Sevastopol
The Second Afghan War 1878 to 1880:
Ali Masjid, Peiwar Kotal, Charisiab, Kabul 1879, Ahmed Khel, Maiwand and Kandahar.
The Zulu War 1878 to 1881:
Isandlwana, Rorke’s Drift, Khambula, Gingindlovu and Ulundi.
The First Boer War 1881:
Laing’s Nek and Majuba.
The Second Boer War 1899 to 1901:
Talana Hill, Elandslaagte, Ladysmith, Belmont and Graspan, Modder River, Stormberg, Magersfontein, Colenso, Spion Kop, Val Krantz and Pieters, Paardeburg, Siege of Mafeking, Siege of Kimberley and Siege of Ladysmith.
And a few others.
Of course one could and should state we are at war now, our financial burden in Afghanistan and Iraq in the last few years has also been great.
So can we make a direct comparison to anytime really ? I don`t think so, so this would be a bout of point scoring that one may see at any question time and is particularly pointless. This kind of “My Dad`s better than your Dad” line is quite ridiculous and helps nothing.
I will agree the growth in the first few months of this new Government is possibly due to the old or other circumstances such as private sector business which does try to continue despite any Government.
At the same time as agreeing growth may possibly have been down to the last Government, one also has to state the rise in 16-24 unemployment figures was too.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/markeaston/2010/12/young_and_jobless.html
If one accepts the highs, that maybe attributable to Government spending, one also has to accept the lows. That said it is highly unlikely this Government will get everything right either which from the electors point of view is the eternal quandry, they`re both wrong and the third party cannot be trusted at all.
Big-up to the Lib-Dem massive of Tim Farron and former leader Sir Menzies Campbell who both have a pair. Well done !
Of course one could and should state we are at war now, our financial burden in Afghanistan and Iraq
And yet curiously at peace with ourselves, not even presenting any likelihood of an alien population from another continent.
The glorious cosmopolitan population of our second city beggars belief!