Alex Hern reports on Ed Balls’s active background role in today’s Prime Minister’s Questions, and his canny prepared graph.
David Cameron again refused to acknowledge any facts which make him look bad today at Prime Minister’s Questions, but this time it was harder than ever to accurately feign ignorance.
Ed Miliband claimed that the autumn statement will mean:
“The poorest third will lose three times as much as the richest third.”
Cameron’s normal attitude would be to claim that the facts were wrong, safe in the knowledge that the fact-checkers aren’t in the commons with him. This time, however, Ed Balls had clearly planned ahead, by printing off a very large copy of the following graph (slide 10, pdf) and waving it at him (2:30 in the vid below):
It appears, however, that the prime minister is incapable of accepting the evidence which is literally in front of his face.
You can watch a video of the exchange below:
Look at the graph deniers squirm, just look at them.
See also:
• “We’re all in this together” – when ‘we’ means the bottom 80% – Will Straw, November 29th 2011
• Kellner: The public don’t like the Tories, but they’ve signed up to their economic argument – Daniel Elton, November 28th 2011
• On the Financial Transaction Tax, why is Osborne on the side of the one per cent? – Shamik Das, November 2nd 2011
• There’s nothing exceptional about 50% tax rates – Declan Gaffney, September 9th 2011
• Cruddas: Big Society failing the “all in this together” test as safety nets go – Daisy Blacklock, April 26th 2011
36 Responses to “Cameron ignores evidence literally in front of his face”
Newsbot9
That’s not what YOU advocated, of course, you advocated them paying the premium our of the already VERY low unemployment benefit. I can read just fine, thanks.
And right, it’s all a conspiracy, the UK needs to be isolationist and lose it’s trade links and the city!
The UK has VERY few foreigners, under half as a share of the population compared to Australia or Canada, but no, Little Englanders like you cry when regions outside London fall below 98%+ “pure bloods”
Newsbot9
Hence your take on the Swiss system, which involved screwing the poor, yes, because it’s part of a system with FAR more generous social payments.
And right, your plan to get them back to work, the Tory plan, of starving the poor so their health is shitty and they’ll be a huge cost on the NHS, overloading it. Got it.
And right, the “underclass”, the scum, which you have to label..at the same time as calling to cut off all immigration and lose the UK it’s trade links, slashing GDP. But hey, no matter, the UK will be more ethnically pure.
1. Right, so, poor people will have to starve and freeze when massive chunks of their earnings are forced into sub-inflation yielding “savings” which in fact benefit the companies balance books, and only those.
2. Right, so you’ll kill the poor even younger by stealing their cash, and then you’ll let…er…the current rules of inheritance apply! Wow!
And right, if you lose your job then you’re SOL, you’ll just have to sleep on the street, when the company kicks your ill ass out at 65, after paying you shit-all for years because after all the minimum wage went decades ago in your plan.
And keep asking questions I answered a long time ago. Reading comprehension —
(I’m hourly paid, even)
Oh, and EVERYONE in this country depends on the government for many services. So there’s no getting away from that.
If you want to, well, even America isn’t good enough. Try Somalia.
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Kyron Hodgetts
Looking back, this is our favourite PMQs this year: http://t.co/EYzbbLO7
Graph deniers, the lot of them. #pmqs
Shamik Das
RT @leftfootfwd: Looking back, this is our favourite PMQs this year: http://t.co/fAq3q06m Graph deniers, the lot of them. #pmqs