Ed Milliband On The Andrew Marr Show

[NW11]

this is what i am saying, it makes no difference whos in power, the uk will go back into recession with the rest of the world the same as it did in 08 and it will come out at a similar time as in 09, do you honestly think the uk will fall back into recession on a stand alone basis or that it will avoid it on a stand alone basis, the global markets are far more important than the whims of a standalone country a good politician is no different to a good investor, he comes in at the start of a boom and gets out before the bust

The UK is governed by bigger forces than Labour or the Tories. Its just a case of who will best place us for the road ahead or give us the gentlest of landings. The Tories may be reputed for being mean and nasty but at least they don't pretend to be anything else.

I do think the UK will revert back to recession, just look at the US, all the downsides of the free market with all of the upsides too. Americans are enterprising and hard working. They have been robbed too but they are likely to come out of this much sooner and stronger than the UK.

The UK is in the middle. Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Portugal have the worst of the worst. We will be "OK" but only just.

[Georgia O'Keeffe]

The UK is governed by bigger forces than Labour or the Tories. Its just a case of who will best place us for the road ahead or give us the gentlest of landings. The Tories may be reputed for being mean and nasty but at least they don't pretend to be anything else.

I do think the UK will revert back to recession, just look at the US, all the downsides of the free market with all of the upsides too. Americans are enterprising and hard working. They have been robbed too but they are likely to come out of this much sooner and stronger than the UK.

The UK is in the middle. Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Portugal have the worst of the worst. We will be "OK" but only just.

Everyone slates Italy,personally i think Italy is alot better placed than the UK, they have a high level of personal savings to cushion the govt debt, the uk doesnt have that cushion, its worth is in assets whos price are a matter of opinion, unless they were to do something radical like nationalise private pensions

[NW11]

Everyone slates Italy,personally i think Italy is alot better placed than the UK, they have a high level of personal savings to cushion the govt debt, the uk doesnt have that cushion, its worth is in assets whose price are a matter of opinion, unless they were to do something radical like nationalise private pensions

If the Italians were to suddenly pull the rug of social security and pensions you will see how long people are happy to dip into said savings. Riots, looting, price hikes. If I were you I would not believe the hype.

Warrent Buffet: You only find out who is swimming naked when the tide goes out.

Italy are as naked as they come.

[Georgia O'Keeffe]

If the Italians were to suddenly pull the rug of social security and pensions you will see how long people are happy to dip into said savings. Riots, looting, price hikes. If I were you I would not believe the hype.

Warrent Buffet: You only find out who is swimming naked when the tide goes out.

Italy are as naked as they come.

i try to avoid hype and stick to cold hard numbers, looking at them id rather be an italian than a Brit going through the next few years. i was going to add the one thing against them is the level of corruption, but that would be a stupid thing to add after the last few years

Edited January 17, 2011 by Tamara De Lempicka

[NW11]

i was going to add the one thing against them is the level of corruption, but that would be a stupid thing to add after the last few years

Why not? it worked so well for new labour.

[porca misèria]

i try to avoid hype and stick to cold hard numbers, looking at them id rather be an italian than a Brit going through the next few years. i was going to add the one thing against them is the level of corruption, but that would be a stupid thing to add after the last few years

Italy has high debt, but doesn't have our horrendous deficit. So a less urgent problem.

As for corruption, we had it even before The Liar, but we were just more subtle about it. Italy had it in politicians, politicians are open to scrutiny and eventually got caught en masse. The UK has it in the judiciary instead, so they're protected by judicial immunity and contempt of court laws, and can't be outed the way Italian politicians were.

Parliamentary expenses are, relatively speaking, a drop in the ocean, hardly worth worrying about.

[Goat]

You said People don't realise how lucky they now are with Cameron or how bad things would otherwise be with Labour, i am saying that things would be no different right now, FTSE would still be 6k, GBP/USD at 1.58, unemployment the same, and everything else the same because had labour or tories won the global markets have/are in perfect sync. Playing the long game the uk is heading towards default and it doesnt really matter who takes it there be it Cameron, Milliband, Jesus or Winona Ryder

Had labour won last year we'd probably have needed a bail out already.

No way that labour's paymasters would've allowed the sort of cuts that are needed; without the conservatives as a government in waiting the markets would've concluded that default was the only option and interest rates woudld've shot up accordingly.

[bomberbrown]

Milliband comes across as a snivelling little shit at the best of times and I so wanted to punch the kunts lights out when he simply rolled out lie after lie to Andrew Marr, I had to switch the tele off. :angry:

2 days later and the rage is still running in me when I dare think about it.

[Tired of Waiting]

Milliband comes across as a snivelling little shit at the best of times and I so wanted to punch the kunts lights out when he simply rolled out lie after lie to Andrew Marr, I had to switch the tele off. :angry:

2 days later and the rage is still running in me when I dare think about it.

Me too. Don't watch this video then.

BBC video here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/nickrobinson/2011/01/ed_clear_on_gor.html

Just an almost outlandish possibility: Does he really believes in what he is saying?! Has he managed to distort his perception of reality and of history to this degree?! People, do not dismiss this possibility out of hand. Humans have an enormous capacity of seeing only what they want to see. It is (just) possible that Ed has managed to convince himself that it was really the "International Financial Crisis" wot done it.

What is the other possibility? That he understands that it was a credit/debt/assets bubble, that finally burst? But he was at the Treasury as the bubble inflated. Admitting it was a bubble would force him to admit that he is one of the main responsible for one of the biggest financial disasters in British peace time history. How could he keep going with this knowledge? Remember, he is the son of idealistic, well-meaning, do-gooders left-wing intellectuals. And he sees himself as such as well.

It is possible that he is not lying, just bonkers - as his predecessor.

Edit: clarity and typo.

Edit 2: I think i'ts not that he is in denial individually. It must be a group thing. Labour, or at least his clique, is in group denial, and have "constructed a narrative" to explain the crisis that absolves them of the main guilt - the fecking bubble.

Talk about "the elephant in the room"!

Edited January 18, 2011 by Tired of Waiting

[Jie Bie]

Do the labour party pay you for making these types of posts?

I'm actually an SNP voter. Anyway, I didn't actually believe Milliband's claims, but only asked about them on here as I didn't think even the Labour Party could get away with telling porkies when there were publicly available statistics which contradicted them.

[SomethingHasToGive]

I'm actually an SNP voter. Anyway, I didn't actually believe Milliband's claims, but only asked about them on here as I didn't think even the Labour Party could get away with telling porkies when there were publicly available statistics which contradicted them.

Unfortunately they probably can. You underestimate the laziness of journalists, especially when it comes down to researching comments whose time has past. If Andrew Marr has memorised that data, then Ed Milliband would be revealed as either incompetent or dishonest. That a politician has blatently lied / is completely clueless on television isn't newsworthy enough to justify continuing the interview offline.

It's a shame that Andrew Marr doesn't have a blog you could post this on. But he doesn't want to be 'inadequate, pimpled and single'

[Tired of Waiting]

Unfortunately they probably can. You underestimate the laziness of journalists, especially when it comes down to researching comments whose time has past. If Andrew Marr has memorised that data, then Ed Milliband would be revealed as either incompetent or dishonest. That a politician has blatently lied / is completely clueless on television isn't newsworthy enough to justify continuing the interview offline.

It's a shame that Andrew Marr doesn't have a blog you could post this on. But he doesn't want to be 'inadequate, pimpled and single'

Miliband main lie was to ignore Labour's bubble as the main cause of the crash.

Miliband is a bubble denier..

Much like his predecessor, Brown the Bonkers.

[dissident junk]

As far as I'm concerned, Labours largest crime wasn't the public debt.

The problem was the mountain of private debt that accumulated under their watch. They thought the public debt was affordable because the GDP created by the expanding private debt allowed them to borrow more and in turn expand the public sector.

The private sector debt created free money for all.. money for government, money into asset values, money into jobs. A socialist's paradise of free money for all to be doled out to grateful citizens by our miracle making heroic leaders of the time.

Of course, with hind sight we know the free money wasn't free, it was borrowed. And we also know that we couldn't afford to pay it back (hence IRs now at 0.5%). Much of the debt had to then be guaranteed by the public purse and money needed to be printed to avoid a crisis of confidence in the markets who feared (quite rightly) that none of this money would ever actually be paid back.

Ed Milliband can sit there and say none of this was Labours fault.. but this all happened under their watch and they were happy to milk the benefits of ten years of borrowed money. His best defence would be "they would have done the same", which is probably true to a greater or lesser extent. It also begs the question, where have all the great leaders gone.. ?

+100

Great sweep of the situation.