MARK Harper trots out the current Conservative claim that the global financial crisis which the Labour Government is tackling is somehow all to do with debt generated by the Government.
Like his leader, David Cameron, Mark's problem is that most people just don't buy it. Why have countries from Iceland to South Korea recapitalised their banks if, as the Tories try to claim, the extraordinary economic difficulties we're all facing are somehow down to Gordon Brown?
What Gordon Brown is, in fact, doing is putting forward real, practical solutions to the economic crisis – solutions which country after country around the world are adopting, and putting into place. That may be hard for Cameron, and Mark Harper, to swallow – but it just happens to be the truth.
Far from coming up with what Mark Harper calls a "clear alternative", what is clear is that the Tories only idea is to do nothing: do nothing to keep Northern Rock alive, do nothing to keep Bradford and Bingley going, do nothing to keep Britain's – and the world's – banking system in place.
We're seeing now from the new US President, Barack Obama, a similar approach to Britain's. As Gordon Brown told the Commons, the one thing President Obama didn't suggest to the people of the USA in his sober but realistic inauguration address was: "Do nothing, America."
Labour's job in government is to get on with things which, in tough times, will offer real help, now, to individuals and to businesses, and real hope for the future.
That's in line with our approach on education, on health, on crime. Take health: in all the economic turmoil, we were still able this week to put in place a specific health promise – that all cancer patients in England would no longer have to pay prescription charges.
That's what Labour is doing in government. In health, in education, on the economy. Across all the issues which are of real concern to people.
That's real help, now. And real hope for the future. – Graham Morgan, Press officer, Forest of Dean Constituency Labour Party.