A dull, intellectually soft Budget, in which the main interest lay in the secondary cast of characters. David Cameron was unimpressive in response, saved only by Ed Balls, whom the Conservative leader patronisingly called "the minister for children". Balls shouted out, "So what?" when Cameron said that taxes were higher than they had been for years. This allowed Cameron to tease him about wanting the Chancellor's job "so much it hurts", which the Tory benches enjoyed immensely. Instead of learning from his mistake, Balls carried on shouting, giving Cameron the chance for the obvious follow-up. "I know he's the minister for children, but he doesn't have to behave like one."
If Balls had been able to keep his mouth shut, the emptiness of Cameron's response might have been exposed. No wonder Cameron and George Osborne regard Balls as one of their biggest assets.
What a sad little chap you must be if you thought Cameron's response was "unimpressive". You are obviously stuck in your Blairite time warp.
Posted by: Diablo | Wednesday, 12 March 2008 at 11:40 PM
I was with Labour friends and they thought Cameron's point about not saving money in the good times was a valid point that will run and run, which concerns them.
Posted by: C Bryan | Thursday, 13 March 2008 at 06:11 AM
I'm afraid there's agreement in these comments so far - your view that "David Cameron was unimpressive in response" is plain daft.
Posted by: GS | Thursday, 13 March 2008 at 07:04 AM
You must have been watching a different budget. Cameron savaged that badger-browed ventriloquist dummy, and rightly so.
Posted by: Spokey | Thursday, 13 March 2008 at 08:19 AM
Agree cameron was suprisingly unimpressive.
Way over did the politics in my view, rather than showing he was ready for government.
Surely the challenge should have been to show he was a steadier hand than darling, surely not hard? Instead he talked about the past, score political points and just talked about how bad it all was.
All good stuff to energize the party, but hardly the response of someone who thinks he could be a year away from being PM
Posted by: geoff | Thursday, 13 March 2008 at 09:22 AM
The real issue is indeed the national debt - Britain's huge deficit, the worst in Europe. I hear that the government intends to nationalise as much as possible - encouraged by the ease with which they nationalised Northern Rock - and then sell to sovereign wealth funds, so saving its economic bacon. But there isn't much left that is not foreign-owned, is there?
Posted by: john problem | Thursday, 13 March 2008 at 09:42 AM
Cameron WAS impressive. To say otherwise is to be dishonest.
Posted by: john | Thursday, 13 March 2008 at 10:59 AM
When the Independent was first published it promised to be truly Independent!
This ridiculous statement by John Rentoul shows that this newspaper is now morally bankrupt and just another Brown mouthpiece!
I think Cameron was dull at PMQ's in his first spell but brightened up. BUT in his response to the budget he was extremely impressive.
Balls certainly lived up to his name.
Still if you give jobs to boys you cannot expect an adult approach.
Come on Independent lets start being HONEST!
Posted by: alan | Thursday, 13 March 2008 at 01:29 PM
Come on John - Cameron was brilliant - got Balls where it really hurt - wheres your independence?
Posted by: Tim | Thursday, 13 March 2008 at 04:47 PM
Balls may be enormously intelligent but is deeply unlikeable - the "so what?" comment displays arrogance and immaturity.
As a Labour Party member of some 20 years I find him quite the most embarrassing senior LP politician I've yet endured.
Posted by: Haldane | Thursday, 13 March 2008 at 09:42 PM
Give over John. Even Heffer thinks Cameron was ok so he must have been brilliant.
Posted by: Steve Garner | Friday, 14 March 2008 at 12:47 PM
Never mind Ed Balls (did he, didn't he) "so what" comment. It would appear one of Labour's MSPs has been critical of the tax hike on a bottle of whisky:
http://www.sundayherald.com/news/heraldnews/display.var.2123287.0.alexanders_cabinet_man_condemns_price_hike.php
It would usually be a side bar at most but Iain Gray was, before becoming an MSP again, a special advisor to a one Alistair Darling.....
Posted by: Neil McLeod | Sunday, 16 March 2008 at 03:21 PM