Darling’s Mystery Cabinet Minister

I have reviewed Alistair Darling’s memoir, Back from the Brink, for The Independent on Sunday, as well as writing an article about it asking “Why did nobody stop Brown?” last week, but there is more to say.

There is, indeed, more to say than is said in the book. Darling writes about a Cabinet minister who behaved badly over the 2009 pre-Budget Report, but says he won’t name “them”:

The wrangling on spending went to the wire. On the night before the pre-Budget Report, I went to bed at 11 o’clock and told my office that no more changes could be made. Next morning, my private secretary told me that one of my colleagues had been demanding to speak to me at 1.30am, trying to reopen the settlement. I’ll spare their blushes.

But The Sunday Times reported at the time that it was Yvette Cooper, who did not want to make cuts to pensions.

There are also more examples of Darling’s understated humour than I had space for. When he arrived at the Treasury as Chancellor he was greeted by Nick Macpherson, the Permanent Secretary. Macpherson observed that ‘there were only about three [people working in the building] who had ever experienced a recession. That was soon put right.’

He soon complained about the way Gordon Brown worked:

Far too often, individuals consulted on an issue did not know that he [Brown] was speaking to others and weren’t aware of the competing arguments. A meeting with Gordon involved many elephants in the room.

Later on, he ponders the changing requirements of political presentation:

It is hard to envisage … Gladstone hugging a Spice Girl, at least in public.

In my review I make the point that Darling served the country badly by staying in post in 2009 when Gordon Brown wanted to replace him with Ed Balls. I think Darling should have forced the issue: either Labour would have gone to the country the following year united at the top behind a policy with which I (and Darling) disagreed, but which would have been at least clear, or Brown would have been replaced by David Miliband.

There was another reason why Darling’s staying on was a mistake. It handed victory to Brown’s boss-politics of intimidation. It allows the belief to survive that the way to the top, and to stay there, is to behave badly in private, bear grudges, issue threats, brief against rivals and plot against members of your own party.

Politics may be what Alan Watkins called a rough old trade, but I do not believe that Brown’s methods are the most effective, and they were deeply damaging to the Labour Party’s reputation.

This was not only Darling’s failing: Tony Blair, Peter Mandelson, Alastair Campbell, David Miliband, Alan Johnson, Harriet Harman and others are all to blame. Even James Purnell, the only one brave enough to resign and say that Labour couldn’t win under Brown, failed to let others know what he was doing so that they might join him.

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• http://www.yahoo.co.uk/ Firozali A.Mulla

  John, Letting a trader lose $2 billion through unauthorized, risky trades is always going to be a black eye for a bank, as it necessarily raises alarm bells about controls and risk management.But it gets even worse for UBS.BBC’s Robert Peston reports that the bank never discovered the losses. It had to be told about them from the alleged rogue trader Kweku Adoboli.The course of events was that on Wednesday Mr Adoboli disclosed to UBS that he had engaged in unauthorised trades, in his role as part of UBS’s so-called Delta One trading team, which deals in exchange traded funds (or tradable investment funds whose proliferation has concerned regulators).UBS then examined his trading positions and rapidly informed the Financial Services Authority and the police. Mr Adoboli was arrested by the police at 3.30am yesterday.All this furthering the notion that UBS is easily among the worst banks in the world.John Gapper rightfully asks whether we’re talking about a rogue trader scandal or a rogue bank given its history of huge losses in both the US mortgage market and even its entanglement with Long-Term Capital Management.What’s more, after 2008, an internal report confirmed that its risk control was not good. I thank you Firozali A.Mulla DBA

• http://www.yahoo.co.uk/ Firozali A.Mulla

  John, China is everywhere like it or not, Many if not all people of wealth have humble beginnings. Someone down the line had to put in the time and the sweat, and the effort to make that buck to propel them and their family forward. They were not content with the status they were in. Unlike Europe, we turned away from the concept that some people are more equal than others, and we don’t have a nobel class. There will always be people that can, and people that stand still. President Johnson’s war on poverty was a wonderful idea. But after spending billions of dollars trying to make life fairer it only showed that to move ahead, you have to work hard and sacrifice. Yes, life is not fair, but it is too precious to throw away. The USA has many social welfare programs to help people in need. After all is said and done, the indivual has to get off their behind and take their own responsibility. I thank you Firozali A.Mulla DBA

• http://www.yahoo.co.uk/ Firozali A.Mulla

  One good newsw I have. U.A.W. Announces Tentative Agreement with G.M. The United Automobile Workers union and General Motors said late Friday that they had reached a tentative agreement on a new labor contract. The union declined to give out details of the deal, which covers 48,500 workers, but said that it included “improved profit-sharing” benefits and “significant improvements to health care benefits.” The deal also was expected to include so-called signing bonuses worth at least several thousand dollars and a modest wage increase for entry-level workers, who have been earning about half as much as other workers. The U.A.W., in a statement, said that it had successfully fought G.M.’s proposals to weaken workers’ retirement benefits and “major concessions” to health care benefits. “In both pensions and health care, the U.A.W. was able to convince G.M. that far greater success could be achieved working together than by cutting pensions or health care,” the statement said. Negotiations with Chrysler and the Ford Motor Company are continuing. This is the only good news i have today. I thank you Rest is sad, bad and for the politicians only and I am not one. I thank you Firozali A.Mulla DBA

• http://www.yahoo.co.uk/ Firozali A.Mulla

  Always If If If If If read on If Gordon Brown is correct about us sliding into a 1930’s type of economy, I shutter to think about what happens next.  Do we have to experience another World War to sort things out?  Do humankind have to lose 3 to 5 billions of her people in a nuclear holocaust to achieve some semblance of order?  Surely this incompetent lot of politicians that we’re now afflicted with can have a think through of a global economic depression that would usher in such a conflagration.  Either we sort this all out now or risk sinking into a situation that could result in a nuclear exchange.  I think that the time for achieving a peaceful coexistence are sadly coming to an end.  We can’t have the capitals of Europe being subjected to daily rioting by civil service, trades unions members and students whilst the politicians miserably attempt to muddle through the morass of economic malaise.Bold thinking is required such as possibly throwing off the shackles of Keynesian economic thought and embracing the Austrian School of Economics.  My reading of the teachings of von Mises and von Hayek shows a way out of the slog of continually exorbitant government debt and long term unemployment extant in Europe.  We require the political will of a future breed of politician.  Those whom can sort through the chaff of special interests and cronyism to attain a high standard of living for all citizens.  We have to rid ourselves of an arrogant political class whom think of us as so much muck on the soles of their expensive shoes.  Gordon Brown personifies this smugness whilst Great Britain descends into the morass of economic stagnation.  It’s all a house of cards that shall come crashing down should one of the players go wobbly.  I don’t think that the current lot of politicians are up to scratch for this job however we have to find someone up to this task.  It’s going to be a slog however our current course shall shortly result in our crashing upon the shoals of economic ruin.  Surely some of the economic historians can provide us some analysis of what transpired in the 1930’s and ways to avoid the same fate of having another World War.  To have the stark reality of a future conflict confronting us should jolt us out of our current complacency into a realisation of the seriousness of the situation.  i thank you Firozali A.Mulla DBA

• http://www.yahoo.co.uk/ Firozali A.Mulla

  I love breaking news. honest I do. Just got this from the Micro.The Obama administration is making a last-ditch effort to head off a major diplomatic embarrassment over the looming Palestinian request for recognition of its statehood at the United Nations. The U.S. is applying diplomatic pressure on Israeli and Palestinian leaders to persuade them to reopen negotiations before the United Nations can take action. Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has said he will take the request for full recognition as a state to the U.N. Security Council in the coming week. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has sent special envoys David Hale and Dennis Ross to the region to hold talks with Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the Guardian reported. And State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said on Tuesday that Washington would “leave no stone unturned” to avoid a U.N. vote and get the Israelis back into peace talks, according to The Telegraph. “Washington is keen to avoid carrying out a threat to veto a Palestinian request for full membership of the U.N., a move likely to further damage America’s already battered reputation in the Middle East, particularly following its strong backing for moves toward self-determination in the region this year,” the Guardian observed. Two of the other four Security Council members with veto power, Russia and China, back the Palestinian effort. But some European and Arab nations are urging Abbas to take his request to the U.S. General Assembly, which can offer only observer status to the Palestinians, to save the U.S. the embarrassment of having to wield its veto.
  The Palestinians insist that their U.N. effort does not preclude resuming negotiations later. The Financial Times reported on Thursday that Netanyahu plans to address the U.N. General Assembly on the same day that Abbas delivers a speech calling for Palestinian statehood. “The General Assembly is not a place where Israel usually receives a fair hearing,” Netanyahu said. “But I still decided to tell the truth before anyone who would like to hear it.” According to the Times, “the announcement suggests that the Israeli government now has little faith in the last-ditch effort by U.S. and European negotiators to stop the Palestinian drive for statehood at the U.N.” But hardline Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman warned on Wednesday that there would be “harsh and grave” consequences if the Palestinians go ahead with their plan to seek statehood, although he did not specify what those consequences might be. In the past he has called for Israel to cut off all relations with the Abbas administration if it goes forward with its U.N. bid, according to The Telegraph.
  Some Israeli ministers are calling for Israel to annex parts of the West Bank if the Palestinians proceed with their statehood request. Other threats include abandoning the Oslo accords, under which the Palestinian Authority was given control of parts of the West Bank and Gaza, and withholding tax revenues that Israel collects on behalf of the Palestinian Authority, the Guardian disclosed. And the U.S. Congress has threatened to cut off financial aid to the Palestinians. I thank you Firozali A.Mulla DBA

• http://www.yahoo.co.uk/ Firozali A.Mulla

  John,Why doesn’t anybody ever ask the obvious question when a politician talks about “sealing the border?” HOW? No country in the history of the world has managed to “seal a border.” It simply cannot be done. The ONLY thing that will stop immigration, both legal and illegal, is when the US becomes a nation nobody wants to enter (and it looks like we’re on our way). North Korea, I’m told, has a nicely sealed border (but not because it can people out, of course, (to repeat) but because nobody wants to go there).The glib “seal the border” meme is never met with any skepticism, especially not from the fawning mainstream media. Would some journalist, somewhere, please do that the next time a candidate brings up the issue? I thank you Firozali A.Mulla DBA

• http://www.yahoo.co.uk/ Firozali A.Mulla

  Jonh,Maybe Bernie Sanders? Maybe Jesse Jackson, Jr. as the Dem nominees? We simply must not have another four years of Barack Obama or his all too similar cohorts in the Republican Party. Republican lite is still Republican. He is still warring and he is harming the social programs. I would not vote for him if hell itself froze over though it will if we get him or the Republican nominee as president in 2012. BTW, Rick Perry should not be a candidate at all. He should be IN JAIL for his obstruction of justice from every angle in the Willingham Case and KNOWINGLY AND INTENTIONALLY causing an innocent man to die in the Texas electric charge. (The foremost firearms expert in the world said the fire that killed the Willingham children was an accident, a tragic accident, but Perry tampered with the commission investigating and let the innocent man die. He wasn’t rich or a very appealing person apparently so he died without much mention of him these days.) I simply don’t understand why the Willingham case isn’t front and center of every discussion of Rick Perry. I thank you Firozali A.mulla DBA

• http://www.yahoo.co.uk/ Firozali A.Mulla

  John, while you wrote, I write,   Allah’s Accuracy, -the eggs of the potato bug hatch in 7 days;-those of the canary in 14 days;-those of the barnyard hen in 21 days;-The eggs of ducks and geese hatch in 28 days;-those of the mallard in 35 days;-The eggs of the parrot and the ostrich hatch in 42 days.(Notice, they are all divisible by seven, the number of days in a week!)Allah’s wisdom is seen in the making of an elephant.The four legs of this great beast all bend forward in the same direction.No other quadruped is so made.God planned that this animal would have a huge body, too large to live on two legs.For this reason He gave it four fulcrums so that it can rise from the ground easily.The horse rises from the ground on its two front legs first.A cow rises from the ground with its two hind legs first.Allah’s wisdom is revealed in His arrangement of sections and segments, as well as in the number of grains.-Each watermelon has an even number of stripes on the rind.-Each orange has an even number of segments.-Each ear of corn has an even number of rows.-Each stalk of wheat has an even number of grains.-Every bunch of bananas has on its lowest row an even number of bananas, and each row decreases by one, so that one row has an even number and the next row an odd number.-The waves of the sea roll in on shore twenty-six to the minute in all kinds of weather.All grains are found in even numbers on the stalks, and the Lord specified thirty fold, sixty fold, and a hundred fold – all even numbers.He has caused the flowers to blossom at certain specified times during the day, so that Linnaeus, the great botanist, once said that if he had a conservatory containing the right kind of soil, moisture and temperature, he could tell the time of day or night by the flowers that were open and those that were closed!There are those who believe there is no God!I HOPE YOU FIND THIS AS FASCINATING AS I DID Rest is the story. I thank you Firozali A.Mulla DBA