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Northern Rock

The shadow Chancellor is increasingly someone who conceals cynical opportunism with a pretty thin veneer of abuse. One would have thought that he might rise to the occasion rather than playing petty politics with the serious matter of the stability of the banking system in this country. He has never had a consistent policy on what to do with Northern Rock—every day brings a new policy and a new stance. Last September, he and the Leader of the Opposition said that they wholeheartedly supported what we had done and that they recognised we were right to take the action that we did to stop the problem spreading into the wider financial system. But when things got difficult for them, they ran away from that support. They were in favour of administration, despite the fact that that could have provoked a fire sale with a huge loss to the taxpayer. They said they were against nationalisation, yet two days later the Leader of the Opposition said yes, he would have to consider all the options, including nationalisation. Their policy today appears to be nationalisation followed by some ill-designed plan to sort out the future of the bank. They have absolutely no coherent view about what to do with this problem. They also fail to recognise the problems that have caused the bank's underlying difficulties in the first place—the problems that arose in the American housing market that have spread to the financial markets right across the world, making it necessary for us to take the action that we have. The hon. Gentleman criticises the decision that I have taken today. He is entitled to take that view, but he might want to have a word with the shadow Chief Secretary, who said on television this morning:"““The Chancellor is quite right; if the private sector isn't willing to pay an appropriate value for a business then it would be wrong to hand it over at an under value.””" I am deeply grateful to him for his support. It is clear that the Conservatives have absolutely no idea how to deal with this problem—all they can do is to come up with proposition after proposition showing their cynical opportunism. Rather than dealing with a serious problem, they have absolutely no answers whatsoever.