Alistair Darling skewered

What a wonderful thing it is to hear Alistair Darling being well and truly skewered by John Humphries on the (not quite so) Toady (as usual) programme this morning. He was quite clearly caught out by John Humphrys and tried to wriggle his way out of trouble; however he can't wriggle as well as Tony Blair, Gordon Brown or Jack Straw - they are the masters of the art. The question that Alistair Darling tried but failed to convincingly answer was the "slow lingering death" question. This bit starts at around 3:45 into the interview.


I have checked in Hansard and the question and answer ran as follows:

"Jim Cousins (Newcastle upon Tyne, Central) (Lab): The whole House will have noted that the Liberal Democrats have as much regard for the 5,500 employees of Northern Rock in the north-east—and the 6,500 nationally—as they had for the job of their former leader. [Interruption.] Two or three faces in public, 10 in private—that is the policy of the Liberal Democrats.

Does my right hon. Friend accept that the policy of nationalisation would lead to a slow lingering death for the jobs of the Northern Rock workers, its assets and Britain’s reputation as a major financial services centre, with my right hon. Friend the Chancellor cast in the role of undertaker—and that only by finding a successor business to grow on those jobs, assets and reputations can we offer any real prospect of the taxpayers getting their money back?

Mr. Speaker: Order. I remind Members that they must ask brief supplementary questions.

Mr. Darling: I agree with my hon. Friend. It is regrettable and surprising that the Liberal Democrats never seemed to support our earlier proposals to keep Northern Rock open. It would also, however, be a mistake to shut off all other options and simply go for one at this stage; that does not seem to me to make any sense at all."


Looks to me as though Jim Cousins did indeed say "Does my right hon. Friend accept that the policy of nationalisation would lead to a slow lingering death for the jobs of the Northern Rock workers, its assets and Britain’s reputation as a major financial services centre, with my right hon. Friend the Chancellor cast in the role of undertaker" and that Alistair Darling answered unequivacably "I agree with my hon. Friend."

I think Alistair Darling should apologise to John Humphries and the UK public for trying to mislead us this morning...



You must listen to the interview, it is the 08:10 interview on Radio 4. I shall be listening it again and again. You can listen to it here.



UPDATE:

The Toady programme this morning at around 08:17 said that the original tape backed up Alistair Darling's argument, I will only agree if they post that tape on their website.