Simon Carr: The new prudence is imprudence

We will never do what the Tories would not do, which is not to do anything

Thursday 01 January 2009 20:00 EST
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A new year message from the Prime Minister:

In my determined, unwavering focus for getting up in the morning to help British people, I can say that I believe now more than ever that we live in the world's greatest Britain. Because we do not just build for tomorrow.

Our plan is to build tomorrow today. That is why I have formed a new global coalition of the world's citizens to reject the old dogma by which hope has been strangled over the last decade of greed, which has been the Conservative ideology of instant defeatism.

In these challenging times, the question is this: Who will lead us out of the Conservative-created crunch? Not the people who created the slump in the first place! Not those who relentlessly talked the currency and the economy down with such devastating results of the worst unemployment since the last Conservative government!

No, we will never not do what the Conservatives would not do, which is to not do anything. We would never not do anything.

Their not doing will not be not done by Not Labour, because we are not Not Labour and never will not be rising to meet challenges and introducing ourselves saying: "Good morning, Mr New Challenge! We aren't Not Labour and here's a trillion pounds to prove it!"

New Labour was created from Old Labour to face new challenges. We created Prudence, Stability and also the Fiscal Framework of Golden Rules.

But times have once more changed, and as a reaction to that, on which we will always keep focussed fairly, enduringly and Britishly, we will follow our eternal values of change, creating New Prudence, New Stability and the New Five Golden Rules (6-10).

New Prudence: The risk of investing £10 trillion is far greater than the risk of not investing it. I can announce today that the money is readily available. And manufacturing it will give a much needed boost to the British printing industry. It is what governments call "an automatic stabiliser", as it automatically stabilises the polls. And this will automatically create the New Stability of inflation, hyper-inflation and World War III.

It is predictability that creates security. And that creates opportunities which we must be ready to seize with our enduring values.

As Churchill led this country through its darkest hours to safety, so this government will also lead the country into the Underground system, from where we can make our leap forward into the future. Not to be prepared to jump into the upturn is old dogma that must be rejected in favour of the New Prudence.

And as we reject the unsustainable Tory collapse in house prices, so we must recognise that Conservatives have meant a decade of suffering for large numbers of home owners for whom "negative equity" is essentially a Conservative policy tool. But it is not right that we should merely pay off the mortgages, as Tories are urging us to do in their do-nothing way.

Instead, as interest rates become negative, in the interests of fairness and social justice, mortgage holders will be paid by their mortgage companies for taking out mortgages.

And the government will repay the mortgage companies. And the Bank of England will supply the funding from its own British presses. It would not be imprudent not to. Worse, it would be Old Prudence.

And that Tory dogma would not be fair for hardworking families. This will instead create the well-being of Britons, which is my unwavering focus that I wake up with every morning determined to do better.

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