Myners talks sense; Hoban does not

Paul Myners, a reader of this blog (right), made some sensible comments in the House of Lords on Tuesday about the weaknesses of the latter part of the Labour Government’s record.

There is nothing progressive about a government that consistently spends more than it can raise in taxation and certainly nothing progressive that endows generations to come with the liabilities incurred, with respect to the current generation …

I found it very frustrating to sit in meetings with some of my fellow ministers talking about creating jobs in the green economy, creating jobs in biotechnology. The Government can’t create jobs. The Government can create the environment which is conducive to the creation of jobs but it cannot create jobs and we mislead ourselves if we believe it can.

He also said that there was “considerable waste in public expenditure”.

This was used by Jonathan Evans, a retread Conservative MP, in Prime Minister’s Questions yesterday and reported gleefully by the Daily Mail this morning. The Mail also reported the rentaquote response from Mark Hoban, the new City minister, who said in fluent political cliché:

Lord Myners has let the cat out of the bag and admitted what we have been arguing all along. Coming after Liam Byrne’s admission that there is no money left, this is yet another shocking indictment of the previous government’s record and the legacy it has left behind that we are now having to deal with.

How utterly depressing that a series of intelligent comments, which could be deployed to support the Coalition Government’s arguments, should be so devalued by such sound-bites-by-numbers and mixed in with Liam Byrne’s completely different letter to his successor (a joke, discourteously disclosed by David Laws) in such a way as to undermine Hoban’s credibility.

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• JohnJustice

  I’m suprised that you are so complimentary about Lord Mynas’s trite remarks, John.

  HIS speciality is narrow financial considerations. Chancellors and Prime Ministers have to look at the broader picture, like preventing runs on the banks and stimulating growth to avoid a recession, which would make the financial situation much worse.

  Huge liabilities were accrued during the war but winning the war was considered to be the greater priority as is the need for averting a deep recession now. These wartime liabilities were easily repaid when the country could afford it and the same goes for our present day liabilities.

  Lord Mynas should stick to what he knows best, money matters, and leave the bigger political and economic stuff to the more enlightened politicians.