I find David Cameron’s rejection of Gordon Brown’s bid to lead the IMF quite appalling. I always thought the Conservatives claimed to be patriotic, until recently singing “Land of Hope and Glory” at their annual conference. We now know they do not put Britain first, living up to Winston Churchill’s damning condemnation of a former Tory Prime Minister, Stanley Baldwin, whom he accused of putting party before country.
Since many believe Gordon Brown has excellent credentials for the IMF post, Cameron and Osborne’s attitude comes not from a desire to support the best candidate, but rather from narrow party advantage.
This Tory-led government would, indeed, find it difficult to blame Gordon Brown for Britain’s economic crisis while at the same time putting him forward for a high-level international economic job. If they came out for Brown, Cameron and Osborne may just have to admit that the global economic crisis had something to do with the parlous state of our economy. Since every Tory and coalition spokesperson has taken all possible opportunities to blame the last Labour government for our economic misfortune, the Tories would lose a major plank of their attack strategy were they to allow this particular rug to be pulled from under their feet.
Quite simply this Conservative-led coalition prefers to support Christine Lagarde, the French Finance Minister rather than a former Labour Prime Minister in order to be able to attack Labour’s economic record. Gordon Brown is one of us, i.e. British, and should, I firmly believe, be our candidate for the IMF top job. There are times when country comes before party and this is one of them.
I completely agree with James Wolfensohn, former Director of the World Bank, quoted in the “Independent” today following his article in the “Evening Standard”, who said “Gordon Brown has proved that he has the leadership skills, the vision and the determination to bring the world together”. Gordon Brown has also been endorsed by Lord Skidelsky, a cross-bench peer and economic historian, not to mention Labour MP Tom Watson.
You talk as if it is just the UK government apposed to Brown – when clearly it isn’t.
Mark Mardell said on the Radio 4 Today programme that Obama would not support Brown. There is on an article on Der Spiegel Online listing a good many potential candidates. Brown’s name is not there. So dream on! One day you may realise the damage he did to this country.
If Mr Cameron and Mr Osborne don’t back Mr Brown then they will be reflecting the attitude of the majority of UK residents who didn’t back him at the last elections.
Mr Brown and Mr Blair cooked up a scheme called the Windfall Tax that was going to fix all of the NHS and schools and whatever else they promised. It didn’t so Mr Brown was the opposite of prudent and continually allowed too much spending and sold off UK assets, even during “the good times”, while the Labour Government tried to resolve long-term issues with short-term fixes. This left the UK is a terrible position when the banking crisis hit. Yes it was an international crisis but our ability to deal with it locally was hindered by the huge debt (increased by the bail outs but huge none the less) and with a lack of assets. You can deny Mr Brown’s terrible record all you like but it doesn’t make it go away.