Tuesday, May 27, 2008

Darling - You Are Between A Rock And... Er, Well Another Rock!

First we had the "most successful Chancellor for 250 years". Now we have the most unsuccessful Chancellor for, well, maybe 250 days. Poor old Alistair Darling - he is really proving to be the patsy for Gordon Brown's useless, and short-lived premiership.
It is just a few months ago he delivered his first Budget speech yet he has already been forced to undo the removal of the 10p tax band by adding to the national debt by borrowing £2.7 billion - in the hope that this would rescue the Labour Party from the first Conservative gain in 30 years at a by-election in Crewe and Nantwich.
Now it looks like he's going to have to backtrack on his proposed plans to increase duty on fuel and vehicle exercise duty - see the Daily Telegraph HERE as just one example of what the MSM are saying.
It also looks like the Northern Rock affair will be coming back to haunt Mr Darling rather sooner than he thought.
As reported in the Financial Times' Westminster blog the rate of repossessions of so-called sub-prime mortgage lenders is at an uncomfortably higher level than the prime lenders. Not good news when piled on top of all the other bad economic signals that seem to pile up day upon day.

Bet the Chancellor wishes he had never taken the poisoned chalice from Gordon Brown. Oh well, he'll be out of his misery soon when he loses his very marginal seat in Edinburgh!

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