We are united on deficit – Balls

Ed Balls

Mr Balls said the most important thing is pulling the country out of the economic crisis

Related stories

Ed Miliband has said there will be no change in Labour’s economic policy, after Ed Balls replaced Alan Johnson as shadow chancellor.

Mr Johnson resigned on Thursday for personal reasons.

Mr Balls, who ran against Mr Miliband for the party leadership, has argued that Labour’s pledge to halve the deficit in four years was a “mistake”.

Mr Miliband said he would bring great expertise to the role adding: “Actually Ed and I have similar views.”

It comes as a policeman who protected Mr Johnson when he was home secretary is referred to Scotland Yard’s standards directorate, following newspaper allegations he had an affair with Mr Johnson’s wife.

Mr Johnson said on Thursday he was resigning for “personal reasons to do with my family”. His appointment to the shadow cabinet just three months ago came as a surprise.

Mr Balls, who was Gordon Brown’s chief economics adviser at the Treasury for years – and his wife Yvette Cooper, a former chief secretary to the Treasury – had been seen as front runners for the job.

BBC political editor Nick Robinson said the reason was partly because Ed Balls and Ed Miliband had worked together for years, with Mr Balls always the senior partner, and because he was known as a combative politician who was closely associated with Gordon Brown.

Mr Balls has argued against deep spending cuts to tackle the deficit and has criticised the approach set out by former Labour chancellor Alistair Darling to halve the deficit within four years.

In an interview with the BBC during the Labour leadership contest last July, Mr Balls said: “Halving the deficit in four years by cutting public spending… I think was a mistake.

“In government at the time in 2009 I always accepted collective responsibility, but at the time in 2009 I thought the pace of deficit reduction through spending cuts was not deliverable, I didn’t think it could have been done.”

“Actually Ed and I have similar views”

Ed Miliband Labour leader

He also said on a previous occasion it “made no sense” for Labour not to rule out raising VAT ahead of the election.

On Thursday, Ed Miliband said: “Ed brings great expertise to this role and I look forward to working with him on the direction Alan and I have set out.

“Economic policy is unchanged. Actually Ed and I have similar views.”

Mr Balls has also said he plans to “carry on” the work started by Mr Johnson.

Asked about his relationship with Mr Miliband and comparisons to that between Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, Mr Balls said he had worked closely with Mr Miliband for 17 years and were a “partnership”.

He added: “Also we have lived very directly through difficult periods when personalities didn’t get on and I think both of us have learned the right lesson from that period, which is stick together, do it together.

“There is a bigger purpose than Ed Miliband or me. The bigger purpose is what’s good for the country, what’s good for our party but in particular taking this argument that the Tory-led coalition are getting it wrong.

“It’s not about ego, it’s about us together doing the job and I am totally 100% confident together we will do that really really well.”

But the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats said Mr Balls’s appointment marked a return to strength for Gordon Brown’s old guard.

Conservative Party deputy chairman Michael Fallon said: “It beggars belief that Ed Balls has been appointed as shadow chancellor of the Exchequer.

“The man who is responsible for Britain’s economic mess has returned. The Labour Party has learnt nothing and is now led entirely by Gordon Brown’s old team.”

And Lib Dem deputy leader Simon Hughes said Mr Balls was “the man who can be pinned with the responsibility for the mega-debt that we are all having to pay off”.

This article is from the BBC News website. © British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *