Merkel may have had a sleep over at Chequers but there has been no love in with Brown.
Merkel has failed to back Brown over a further stimulus package. She said that the first German stimulus package representing 4.2% of GDP had not kicked in yet and any talk of further actions were premature.
George Osborne has summed Brown’s position up perfectly:
Central to Gordon Brown's attempt to draw a political dividing line with the Conservatives in the run up to the Budget, has been his claim that the whole world is signed up to yet more debt-funded fiscal stimulus.
That plan, which he hoped the G20 summit would provide cover for, is falling apart as it becomes clear that other countries like Germany share Conservative concerns about rising debt levels.
Hopefully this weekend Gordon Brown has learnt his lesson that he should stop trying to use the international stage to fight his domestic political battles, and instead focus on getting international agreement on banking reform and trade that really would have a stimulating effect on the world.
Looks like the £50m G20 will meet to agree a deal on tax havens and not much else.
Manchester United have just gone down 1-4 to Liverpool at home. It looks like Brown has lost by the same margin to Angela Merkel.
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There's no love lost between Merkel and Brown - or Brown and Sarkozy come to that.
ReplyDeleteIn a sense Osborne is right: Brown should forget international and concentrate on national. But, he won't. He's f*cked up nationally and this international stage was his last chance. Putting back the Budget until after the G20 in April was just a stage-prop, a forlorn hope of Labour to stay in office. Obama was never going to ride to the rescue of Brown.