Monday 11 February 2013

Darling or Osborne?

It's come to a pretty pass that we can even think about having a debate about who is the better Chancellor of the two chancers named above.

'Badger' Darling presided over the most excessive boom and bust this Country had seen in generations, even putting the Great Depression to the test. Bullied by the politically driven insanity of Gordon Brown to spend as much money as possible, raise taxes and allow the Banks to do anything as long as they paid large tax revenues, Darling oversaw total catastrophe in 2008. Up until that time he made as far as I can see not one a single good decision. After the Lehman collapse, and the hubris that smashed the Government, Darling became much better. He took the big decision to save RBS and HBOS to prevent financial meltdown. The decision on Northern Wreck and other secondary institutions was less good. His final budgetary plans to push through consolidation in the fiscal expenditure was with hindsight not a bad plan at all.

Osborne started with a broken trainset, so his challenges were far worse to deal with. With events also moving out-of-control for the first two years, little that he did would really matter beyond the first austerity budget. This successful, tough fiscal consolidation bought the Government breathing room to work on more basic reforms of the economic system; sadly, the key area which is the over-complex tax system, has remained untouched. Added flexibility to the workplace is great for employers but was already a success in the UK. Worse, the fall in Government spending was barely matched by private sector expansion. As tax receipts continued to fall, the public finances and size of the state have become worse, not better. By the second budget though reducing of the top rate of tax was used to slaughter the budget. Osborne has never been the same since, hiding where possible and having a much lower public profile.

So there we go, the last 2 men at the helm? Who do you think has done the better job? There is a poll on the sidebar running until Friday.

(It's not got so bad that we need to ask whether Cable or Balls should be included, neither of them are within touching distance of sanity).

CU

30 comments:

Bill Quango MP said...

Alistair Darling was not only Brown's chief supporter and chancellor, but one of the Clunking Fist's closest friend--
His "unhappy love."

Darling was one of the few to take some responsibility for New Labour's financial management crimes, even as he denied knowledge of the Hollow-Cause.

Today we are still unraveling the threads of Alistair Darling's personality: The genius that made him indispensable to the New Labour Political machine, the conscience that drove him to repent, and the emotional wounds that made him susceptible to Brown's lethal magnetism.

Excerpt from
Alistair Darling: The Good Nasty: His battle with the truth.

andrew said...

Neither.
I have the feeling that pretty much the same things would have happened at about the same time had either been in charge.
This post also overstates the amount of good (or bad) either would have really been able to effect.
Eithers term in office would have been / will be cut v.v. short if either came up with something more than a small difference from each other.
Looking at a spreadsheet someone knocked up in 2010 (after a quick google), in 2010 the difference in spending was forecast to be 33bn in 2013 - about 4.8% (33bn / 680bn) - just giving the public sector 'reasonable' pay rises would have soaked up about half of that.

Budgie said...

CU, it simply isn't accurate to say that Darling "presided over the most excessive boom and bust ...". Darling wasn't installed until June 2007 by which time the "boom" was effectively over, and the bust was set in stone.

It was Brown who presided over not just the "boom" but also the fatuous rule changes that encouraged the bust. Darling did not have a hand in this, he was off doing other things like Transport and Scotland. Brown's henchman was Balls, not Darling.

Ideally Darling should have reacted better to N Rock keeling over in autumn 2007 (due to the start of the 'credit crunch'), but until the bust became obvious Brown still had far more political power than Darling.

Darling was good enough not to get in the way of saving the UK banking system from across the board collapse. In contrast Osborne hasn't had to deal with a comprehensive bust and has made a mess of the recovery. Osborne is not even in the same league.

Anonymous said...

My gut feeling is that Darling did the best he could in the circumstances that were not of his making. I also felt that he had a handle on what was required to get us out of the mire.
Osbourne certainly had a poor hand dealt him and I feel sorry for him my concern is that I simply have little confidence in both his ability and his devotion to the task. On balance I would have preferred Darling to have carried on in the role.

Jer said...

Darling dropped some major bollocks, notably by nationalising NR either due to panic or for political reasons. I'm fairly sure his heart was in the right place, and he probably prevented some worse things happening.

Osborne has done... nothing useful.

On balance have to give it to Darling just because he seems more effective. Doesn't really seem that Osbourne is driving the economic policy, for good or ill.

idle said...

The choice you offer is poor. One is a socialist, albeit a fairly pragmatic one, but who was scared of his boss and therefore couldn't really complain about the hand he was dealt.

The other pitches himself as a conventional Tory-with-a-conscience, inclined to a smaller state but with wide public appeal. His record, however, shows him to be a rank opportunist who pledged in 2007 to match Labour's 2008-11 spending plans, only to ditch the pledge the moment the economy hit turbulence before the crash. He, also, cannot complain about the hand he was dealt, for he planned the same course.

Neither deserve to be close to the controls. We should offer the job to the pony-tailed Swede, pronto.

DtP said...

Geez, it's like choosing which method of torture you'd prefer...err...yup, electrodes to the chubblies it is then!

I think i'd have to go with Darling. As per Budgie, Darling was thrown in too late to effectively be responsible for anything and Brown was so mental and had such a keen grasp of the Treasury under his mentalness that Darling never really stood a chance. The interview he gave warning that the fan was covered in shit 'unleashed the forces of hell' from Brown's new office.

In short, Darling was screwed. However, Osborne - 'the great Tory strategist' is just bloody incompetent and instead of reducing government largesse he's just going for the shirkers - attacking shirkers should be part of a wider remit but it just bloody well isn't.

Lynton Crosby should get Cammo to just execute the lad, he's had his chance, he flunked it, goodnight. Hmm....yeah, right!

Anonymous said...

Probably a bit extreme,but:

Asking which one of two candidates is the better Chancellor, is like asking which one the two pre-world war two leader is the nicest.

Then offering a choice between Stalin and Hitler.

I'm sorry, but they are ALL bloody awful.

Blue Eyes said...

I think Darling knew precisely what was happening even before he became Chancellor. But he didn't preside over the boom as others note above. He also was not the Chancellor under Brown.

Darling would have been a good Chancellor under Blair.

I am a bit confused about this statement:

"successful, tough fiscal consolidation"

Osborne wrote some bold numbers on a piece of paper. That bought him some time while the world looked like it was unravelling. Departmental spending has since fallen by a whole 3% or something while the reduction in capital spending has been swamped by the increase in welfare spending. That's not really what I would call a consolidation!

hovis said...

Darling was the a hair's breadth better. (I can't believe I'm sayin this.) His post election projections were similar to (if not better than) Osbourne's have turned out. Yes there is and was much wrong with him, but he generally got the big calls right.

Unfortunately I think Labour would have been better placed to clear up the mess due to (i) luvvie media (BBC et al)onside (ii) more autocratic discipline (iii) the "only Nixon could go to China" syndrome.

Whether true or not it appears Osbourne as with the most, if not all coalition actions talked the talk but did f*ck all else.

James Higham said...

Yes, as said above - don't you mean who was the worse?

Nick Drew said...

I suspect history will record that as Chancellor, Osborne was a thoroughgoing charlatan (as well as a crap strategist, naturally)

other than that I expect he is a nice chap

oh - wait a minute -

dearieme said...

Appoint Mourinho.

Budgie said...

Here's England's history for the next five years all due to Osborne's (and Cameron's) incompetence:
Scotland goes independent, and pays the price of being admitted to the EU by being required to adopt the euro.
Without Scotland the UUK (UnUnited Kingdom) loses its UN seat to the EU/EZ.
The ongoing Cameron/Osborne financial crisis is exacerbated by the breakup.
The lights start to go out because of Cameron's fixation on CAGW.
Cameron wastes more money on crackpot 'prestige' projects like HS2.
There is all round continuing institutional failures (NHS, Police, 'Science', Social Services, BBC, Teaching, Electricity, Water, MoD, DfID, Food industry, Pensions, etc, etc, etc).
Further defence cuts puts 'us' in the 4th league, despite which Cameron commits us to ever more stupid foreign adventures.
A new Lab-Lib local government scraps everything nuclear.
The Falklands are lost to Argentina.
There is no referendum on the EU.
The UUK's economy becomes so bad we have to be rescued by the EU/EZ.
The euro grows strong, powering the EZ to eclipse London.
Goodbye England, Scotland and the UK, now just a few semi derelict districts of the New Roman Empire.

Blue Eyes said...

Budgie, you know there are pills available these days?

Anonymous said...

The drugs don't work.

DJK said...

Deinately Darling. Osborne's way out of his depth; his only qualification as Chancellor is that he's a mate of Dave.

Budgie said...

BE, Soma?

liberal engineering said...

Darling and Brown only saved the Scottish banks because they had offices within their respective constituencies.

They were already at sleep at the wheel when Northern Crock went belly up.

At the very least the plug should have been pulled on RBS as a lesson to other banks 'punching above their weight' and partaking in stupid acquisitions like ABN Amro.

Both of these men have control without responsibility.

Anonymous said...

None of them are any good. The best description of what this country has become is to be found here: http://axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/Article_65047.shtml

Agence Referencement said...

Vraiment une rencontre entre deux colosse.Je pense que tel occasion ne s'approvisionne pas que rarement.

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Une telle description pour un si merveilleux chantier d'affaire sans détour pour nous faire laisser saint dans une grande perspective sans relâche il faut toujours viser l'horizon pour on faire entreprendre un beau et excellent avenir très important dans la vie des hommes

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First of all, i would like to thank you for sharing this piece of writing.Then, i want to say that each one of us has his/her own ideas and way of accomplishing tasks.And this description is erally interesting and true.We have to choose the one who we find suitable.

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One of the main difficulties in choosing between the two chancers is that usually someone can changes his way and his behaviour when he may become in certain position.so it is really difficult to choose the better chancellor.

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THE COMPETITION is between the two chancers named Darling and brown.
I REALLY don't know who is betteR.Maybe darling and maybe brown!!!! this is interesting as well!

referencement maroc said...

"'Badger' Darling presided over the most excessive boom and bust this Country had seen in generations, even putting the Great Depression to the test. ""Osborne started with a broken trainset, so his challenges were far worse to deal with. With events also moving out-of-control for the first two years, little that he did would really matter beyond the first austerity budget." we may analyse the above and find who is the better chancellor.

Assurance info said...

To chose the right person we have to see the one who will be good for the position.We have to chose the one who we can trust more!!!
This is hard to some extent cause some people may change their personality after taking the position.We have to do the right thing at the right time.

Topographie Beni Mellal said...

It's come to a pretty pass that we can even think about having a debate about who is the better Chancellor of the two chancers named above.
THIS IS REALLY INTERESTING ARTICLE!!!
Thank you for sharing it!

cours PDF said...

'The decision on Northern Wreck and other secondary institutions was less good. His final budgetary plans to push through consolidation in the fiscal expenditure was with hindsight not a bad plan at all' it is clear that any decision needs alot of thinking !!
This is really important!!!

Agence communication said...

"" 'Badger' Darling presided over the most excessive boom and bust this Country had seen in generations, even putting the Great Depression to the test. Bullied by the politically driven insanity of Gordon Brown to spend as much money as possible, raise taxes and allow the Banks to do anything as long as they paid large tax revenues, Darling oversaw total catastrophe in 2008. Up until that time he made as far as I can see not one a single good decision. After the Lehman collapse, and the hubris that smashed the Government, Darling became much better. He took the big decision to save RBS and HBOS to prevent financial meltdown. The decision on Northern Wreck and other secondary institutions was less good. His final budgetary plans to push through consolidation in the fiscal expenditure was with hindsight not a bad plan at all.""