Lord Newby
Main Page: Lord Newby (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Newby's debates with the HM Treasury
(12 years, 10 months ago)
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Lord Sassoon
My Lords, economic growth has been weaker for reasons that include, particularly at the moment, the ongoing eurozone crisis. Inflation has been high but is now coming down significantly from its peak last September. In those circumstances, the automatic stabilisers apply and expenditure goes up. However, we are getting two very different messages from the party opposite, one implicitly urging faster consolidation and the other asking for more expenditure. Which is it to be? This Government will get borrowing down by £147 billion a year by 2016-17. That is what is important.
Lord Newby
My Lords, on Monday, Moody’s said that the UK’s triple A rating could be downgraded by,
“reduced political commitment to fiscal consolidation, including discretionary fiscal loosening”.
Does the Minister have any idea what Moody’s might have had in mind?
Lord Sassoon
My noble friend probably thinks that Moody’s have in mind what I have in mind: the policies of Mr Ed Balls. However, the chances of those being implemented are, fortunately, small. Only yesterday, a respected City broker from BGC Partners said:
“Ed Balls can whinge all he likes but you only have to look at a compendium of 10 year bond yields to know that the UK Chancellor, George Osborne is on the right track. For the Chancellor to take his foot off the gas in terms of cutting the debt reduction would be insanity personified!”.