Osborne blames Brown for downturn

George Osborne has sought to pin responsibility for the UK credit crisis on Gordon Brown.

The shadow chancellor said in a speech to the Policy Exchange think-tank on Monday that the prime minister's time at the Treasury did not prepare Britain for the economic downturn.

The speech came as a new Harris poll for the Financial Times found that 68 per cent of voters are "not confident at all" in Labour's ability to handle the crisis.

And Osborne argued that voters are right to be sceptical.

"At the root of the problem is the failure of the government's economic policy," he said.

As chancellor and now prime minister, Brown had "rested his claim to competence on three pillars - stability, prudence and competitiveness", the Conservative spokesman added.

"Instead, after a decade of worldwide growth, we have ended up with housing boom followed by bust, spending followed by debt, and a country finding it more and more difficult to compete.

"The Labour Party are not simply attacking their prime minister's style, they are attacking his decisions - the 10p income tax rise on the low paid, the failure to control the debt bubble, the inability to lead the country in difficult times.

"And so Labour is fighting itself instead of fighting for the country."

Alternatives

Osborne also set out some of the Tories' alternative ideas.

"Of course, given the disarray in the government, there is unlikely to be an election anytime soon - much to my regret," he said.

"So the responsible thing is to wait to see the economic conditions at the time of the election before we can set out our final economic plan. But it is already clear that there is an alternative.

"We could help families who cannot afford a mortgage by taking 9-out-of-10 first-time buyers out of stamp duty.

"We could help businesses large and small with a lower tax rate paid for by a simpler system. We could fix our system of financial regulation by giving the Bank of England more power to act in a crisis.

"We could put our public finances on a safer footing, but over the long-term, growing government more slowly than our economy grows. And we could look at new ways at preventing another debt bubble.

"This is the alternative to the lack of action from the government. This is the alternative to the failed policies of Gordon Brown."