Bankruptcy

Debate between Baroness Seccombe and Lord Sassoon

Tuesday 7th December 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Sassoon]

My Lords, leaving aside the fact that the mortgage payers of this country would be somewhat upset to be thought of as having brought it upon themselves by reckless expenditure, the point is, as the IMF succinctly put it in its report of 27 September 2010:

“The consolidation plan and implementation of early measures to tackle the deficit—one of the highest in the world in 2010—greatly reduces the risk of a costly loss of confidence in fiscal sustainability and will help rebalance the economy”.

That was what the IMF had to say.

[Baroness Seccombe]

My Lords, does my noble friend agree that, if we had not taken action so quickly, we would have been a further £100 billion in debt by 2015?

[Lord Sassoon]

Indeed. I am grateful to my noble friend and I think that points out how close to bankruptcy we were.