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Capital Gains Tax (Rates)

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. There is no doubt that the lessons of history are completely clear. Those countries that grip their problems and deal with them do so in their own time and their own way and in a proactive manner. Those countries that fail to do so end up like Greece and Spain—with socialist Governments—grappling with measures that will be far more severe than anything that we have introduced in this House. I simply remind the right hon. Member for Doncaster North that Lord Keynes, the great Liberal economist who continues to be an economic hero to me, was once famously accused of changing his mind. He splendidly replied, "When the facts change, sir, I change my mind. What do you do?" The right hon. Gentleman's principal problem today is that the facts have changed and he has not changed his mind. That is precisely the argument. I would merely remind the right hon. Gentleman of another dictum from a rather great economist—also something of a hero of mine; I should probably be looking towards the Liberal Democrats here—J. K. Galbraith. He served a number of American Presidents, including J. F. Kennedy, and I should point out to the right hon. Gentleman that it was J. K. Galbraith who said that the essence of leadership was for a leader to confront the greatest dangers of the people they aspire to lead. The right hon. Gentleman is not doing that.