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Osborne's 'only business experience is running the Bullingdon Club bar'
Nicholas Cecil, Chief Political Correspondent21.09.09
Vince Cable today savagely attacked George Osborne as the Liberal Democrats called for a TV showdown on the economy.
The party sought to play its "trump card" with a debate between Mr Cable, shadow Chancellor Mr Osborne and Chancellor Alistair Darling.
Turning his fire on Mr Osborne, the Lib-Dem Treasury spokesman said the senior Tory's business experience was limited to running the "Bullingdon Club bar account".
Mr Cable, a former chief economist at Shell, was due to tell his party's annual rally that neither Labour nor the Conservatives should be trusted on the economy. "There are those who would have the British people believe that there are only two options," he was expected to say. "The first is to trust the people who led us into the present mess to get us out of it: but this would be a triumph of hope over experience.
"The second, to trust a team of young things whose life-time experience of business management is confined to the Bullingdon Club bar account: people who have no beliefs or convictions, whatever, beyond a sense of entitlement to rule and a mission to look after their own."
With Mr Cable Britain's most trusted senior politician, according to a recent poll, Lib-Dems are finding that floating voters are being swayed by him.
There is a precedent for such a TV debate, one having taken place in 1997 between Gordon Brown, Ken Clarke and Malcolm Bruce. Lib-Dem foreign affairs spokesman Ed Davey supported the idea, saying: "If you mention Vince Cable, it's like putting the joker out ... our trump card."
Gordon Brown is already under pressure to go head-to-head with David Cameron and Nick Clegg in a live TV debate.
Reader views (9)
Has any chancellor in recent memory ever had a proper job outside politics?
- Steve, Brentford
What is really needed now, is someone to leak the unpaid state of certain MPs slates in the heavily subsidised bars of the Palace of Westminster.
- Threaded, Roskilde, Denmark
Ballroom maestro Vince sounds like he's miffed at missing out on a spot on Celebrity Strictly.
- Ted, London
"Former chief economist at Shell"
Scratch beneath the veneer of that statement and you will probably find that he was in charge of paper clip supplies at a petrol station. If he had such a dazzling career at Shell and is such a visionary economic genius, why is he only a spokesman for a party that has zero chance of being elected?
- Nobby Clark, Perth, the Scottish one
In a recent interview on Hardtalk with Andrew Mcniel, Cable had great difficulty in convincing people of his stance on anything, since he always seems to be walking on shifting sands. To cap his unpleasant attitude, Cable surpassed himself in calling for "God forbid" if George Osborne were installed as Chancellor, not a statement one would attribute to any possible statesman.
Cable constantly and subtlety shifts his position on any number of subjects and his only claim to fame was to be in a position for his warnings about Brown's ineptitude to be a heard, a subject many sane Britons were aware of, but could NOT be heard.
- Bingham Macnamara, lymington, hampshire
Check any poll you like and the LibDems get around 17%. What they think is irrelevant.
- Paul, London
If one takes Mr Cable's thinking a little further, we would need to get rid of most of the current gang of poiliticians since they appear to be the product of the system(researcher/PPE grad/Eton) rather than the real world. Ask yourself, who would ever employ any of them outside Westminster?
- Colin Macpherson, Gramat France
I agree that Vince Cable makes a lot of sense. Unfortunately it's a package deal and all the the other non-identities and ridiculous policy baggage come along with him. Does anybody seriously think that Gordon Brown and Alistair Darling will agree to debates?
- Mark, London
And what have the Liberals run lately? The basement of the Liberal Club . . .
- Roz, France
