By Tim Montgomerie
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It's always called Ken Clarke's golden legacy but, in reality, Norman Lamont laid most of the foundations for the strong economy that Gordon Brown inherited in 1997. And don't just take my word for it. Ruth Lea made the case for Norman Lamont in a CPS paper. Lamont's policies squeezed out inflation, simplified the tax system, moved the public finances to balance and deepened the Thatcher-era supply-side reforms.
I mention Lord Lamont – not just because we've passed the twentieth anniversary of Britain's exit from the ERM (about which he has recently written) – but also because he was the last Chancellor to inherit and tackle a tricky deficit (although nothing like the one inherited by George Osborne).
The former Tory Chancellor has written for today's FT as part of that newspaper's 'Plan for Britain' series. Unlike some of the other contributors to the series he does not think that even more borrowing is the answer. His piece contains some choice quotes which I highlight below…
Read the whole article here.
The idea that deficit reduction can be avoided may not have reached the offices of Ed Miliband and Ed Balls but it has certainly dawned on France's Socialist government. Elected on a platform of opposition to austerity the new French president is now promising the most austere budget in twenty years. French spending will be cut in real terms and there'll be 20 billion Euros of higher taxes.