Right this had to be cleared up. As you probably know the Telegraph recently published leaked documents on Ed Balls’ role in the Gordon Brown’s camps attempt to oust Blair. It seems from the documents that Balls was a primary agitator in the attempts to demand a leaving date from Blair and presenting Brown as a Prime Minister in waiting……..well is any of this new? Of course not! Will it effect his ability to do his job as Shadow Chancellor? Again, of course not! Will it mean Balls will follow a similar path to his former master, Brown and attempt to oust Ed Miliband? Of course not as unlike Blair and Brown, Balls and Miliband actually ran against each other in the leadership election which was conclusively resolved (if you exclude disgruntled sore-loser supporters of David Miliband). And frankly, Labour is far beyond the petty squabbles of the Blair-Brown and is a largely united force unlike after losing power in the 1950s and 1980s. So all of this is totally irrelevant, we have moved on.

There’s also accusations that Balls alongside Brown ignored warnings and continued spending increases well above inflation and so further created a deficit before the crash of 2008. Come off it! These claims were directed around the year of 2006….when Balls was merely a back-bench MP. Of course you have to remember this is coming from the Telegraph and these claims have jumped on by particularly Michael Gove. This is all very well, but Gove fails to mention that Gideon was committed rigorously to Labour’s spending plans up until the 2008 crash and that on the eve of the 2008 crash Brown had a lower deficit than he had inherited back in 1997 as Chancellor.

Max