No thank you, Gordon

From the man who "abolished boom and bust" comes the request to let him "finish the job". No matter which party you support, the reply must be "No, thank you." Here's why.

In 1997, the new Labour government inherited a thriving economy. By many measures, it was the strongest in Western world, with inflation low, debt low and unemployment dropping.

By April 2010, the UK economy was arguably the second worst after Greece's. National debt is higher than any time in living memory, excluding post-WW2. There is a good summary of the debt here, together with several clear charts. Debt is also forecast to increase for the next few years by well over £160 billion each year.

Let's put that in perspective: that's more than we spend on education, police and defence put together. If we shut down all our schools, closed all the police stations and disbanded our army, navy and air force we'd still be running up debt under Labour's economic policies.

So, no thank you Gordon Brown. You're a spendthrift. We don't want you to finish the job because we know in reality you would finish the country.

Thank you, Nick Clegg

It's been 10 days since Nick Clegg upset British politics with a strong performance in the first of the leaders' debates. At this moment, he appears to have lifted the Liberal Democrats from their traditional poor third place in British politics to a close second. In addition, he's changed the nature of the debate: young people, normally the least likely to vote, are chatting eagerly about politics at work, in universities and online. A lot more of the discussion is positive.

Most importantly, from my point of view, Clegg appears to have done what no other politician has managed in recent years: he's finished off Gordon Brown as a political force.

And you can't deny he has sex appeal. I was speaking to a young lady (remember I am over 50, so anyone under 30 is young) the other day and she was singing Clegg's praises. She'd never talked about politics before. I don't recall her exact words but in essence she said that previously she hadn't intended voting but now she was going to vote LibDem. Clegg, she felt, would make a great prime minister: well-spoken, clear ideas, representing real change, fresh, and so on. "What do you think of LibDem policies?" I asked. With a slightly embarrassed smile she admitted she didn't know much about the policies.

Actually, at this stage, that's OK. The important thing is getting young people interested and involved. Over the next ten days they will learn a lot about politics. Some will stay LibDem; others will find that once that first glow of romance dies out then they'll choose another party and I expect they will see a lot to encourage them in the Tory Party: sound finance, green policies and genuine caring about the individual. No party gets everything right but the Tories do more than most.

Democracy is at its best when it's vibrant and ideas and ideals are debated with good-natured passion. There are many young people who will become Young Conservatives who might never have shown any interest without the debates and the change they have brought to British politics.

So, indeed, I would like to thank Nick Clegg today for the change he's made in politics.

Vince Cable - Economic Expert

Andrew Neil (who chairs the BBC's parliamentary programme) interviews Vince Cable.



Thank you, Guido.

Who will you choose?

Thank you, Ian Dale, for creating this.

And for all my friends and acquaintances who are not sure whether they should vote this time ... well have a look!

Quote of the Day

"If we want to bring down unemployment in a sustainable way, neither rescuing [car manufacturers] nor funding more road construction will do it. We need to create a big bushel of new companies — fast. … Good-paying jobs don’t come from bailouts. They come from startups. And where do startups come from? They come from smart, creative, inspired risk-takers. How do we get more of those? There are only two ways: Grow more by improving our schools or import more by recruiting talented immigrants. Surely, we need to do both ... so we can develop a much more strategic approach to attracting more of the world’s creative risk-takers"

New York Times columnist Thomas L. Friedman

Thomas Friedman was talking about the US economy, but it applies equally well here.