Alistair Darling defends the G20 summit progress as the Tories say the PM failed to secure a global tax cutting...

Considering Alistair Darling “controls” the greatest proportion of the cost of fuel, he’s got some nerve to be taking these sort of cheap, populist positions. Where was the tax relief when the oil prices pummelled working families and businesses over the summer? Everyone has to do their bit, Mr....

Alistair Darling says it is vital to provide funds to small business as he prepares to unveil a £4bn package of...

Alistair Darling is to signal a new approach to fiscal policy, saying his "core objective" is to help the UK through a...

Chancellor Alistair Darling is to offer reassurance that the government will not borrow irresponsibly because of the global financial...

Did the Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling lie to us over the Icelandic bank guarantee for...

MR Alistair Darling, a profile: Mr. Darling used to boast to Wendy that her mother not only loved him but respected him. He was one of those deep ones who know about stocks and shares. Of course no one really knows, but he quite seemed to know, and he often said stocks were up and shares were down in a way that would have made any woman respect him – Peter And Wendy, J.M. Barrie You’ll belive man can fly… Alistair Darling To Make Banks Run Like Trains Campaign To Have Alastair Darling Barred From All British Pubs A Budget Hangover From Norman...

ALISTAIR Darling is the man who ran the railways. He now runs the country’s banking system. Customers trying to borrow their own money from the banks they now own should book their place in the queue in advance and observe that there is a bus replacement service ever second Wednesday. Anyone arriving at a bank without a ticket may be liable to being abused and/or threatened with a fixed penalty notice. Mr Darling would like it on the record that though he is in change of carpets, rope, stantions (fixed (blue) and retractable (black)), paying-in slips, pen wire and official use of the word “Next!”, he is not in charge of pens attached to pen wire, cashier windows, musak, envelopes and rulers with calculators fixed one...

In The Financial Times today, Alistair Darling, our beloved and revered chancellor, has penned his thoughts. As he toddles off to Washington, he tells us:We need to shift the IMF's focus towards surveillance of the links between the financial sector and the real economy. It will identify risks in advance, co-operate with the Financial Stability Forum to design policy and regulatory responses and strengthen links between ministers, in the Group of Seven and beyond, to ensure effective follow-up. The world economy is changing. Sticking with the solutions of the past is not an option. Now, more than ever, we need new ideas."…It will identify risks in advance"?Bit late for that isn't it? Or is Darling thinking in terms of "better luck next time"?What's the market in soup kitchen futures...

Nick Watt, Polly Toynbee, Julian Glover and William Keegan discuss the government's £500bn rescue plan for Britain's banks unveiled by Gordon Brown and Alistair...

Alistair Darling is flying to Washington to discuss the cutting of interest rates by six central...

Alistair Darling is flying to Washington to discuss the cutting of interest rates by seven central...

Chancellor Alistair Darling says the government will do whatever necessary to maintain stability of the financial...

Alistair Darling says he is willing to take "some pretty big steps" to stabilise the banking...

Darling intervenes amid fears of an exodus of savings from the UK to Ireland as a result of the...

EXAMPLE ONEIn a speech on 18 May, David Cameron said this (as reported in the Daily Mail)...Mr Cameron hopes his offer of a return to what Lady Thatcher called "live within your means" will chime with disillusioned voters.Five months later, at today's Labour conference session, Chancellor Alistair Darling the BBC reports...Mr Darling said the government would be "disciplined" in its attitude to the public finances and would have "to live within its means". Funny how at the time of Cameron's speech, he was accused by Labour of returning to rampant Thatcherism...EXAMPLE TWOToday the BBC reports ...When asked earlier by the BBC if income tax would go up Mr Darling declined to answer "yes" or "no", instead saying "it is not the time to take money out of the economy".Yet a year ago, he seemed...

Darling (pounding table): "Now look here - you're all rolling in cash and we are broke. So you are going to give us piles of cash?"Oil companies: "No we're not."Darling (muttering): "Windfall tax...."Oil companies: "Just you try - and we feck off to Ireland."Darling (meekly): Biscuit, anyone?Courtesy of Marquee Mark in a...

This week's Private Eye has some fun with the account of his youthful politics that Alistair Darling was allowed to get away with in his widely reported interview in last Saturday's Guardian.According to the Decca Aitkenhead, the reporter who wrote it up:Studying law at Aberdeen, he stood for election in the student union, but not for a party. "I was just quite interested in getting things done." His manifesto favoured "strictly bread-and-butter issues, things like food prices in the student refectory". When he joined the Labour party in 1977, he never expected to be more than a member. "I was enjoying becoming a lawyer."He'd simply realised, he explains, that "if you want to make any changes, there's only one way you can do it, and that's by getting into a position where you can...

…if you want to understand the recession, and where Alistair Darling is going wrong, then you need to have a grasp of the essentials of damsonomics. Alistair Darling, things are even worse -... [Visit boris-johnson.com for the full post and more information about Boris!]...

There is a nice summation of the Alastair Darling ‘row’ here. If you’ve been reading the financial pages for the past two years you’ll see all Darling was doing was repeating the words of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the Deputy Governor of the Bank of England. So, kudos to Larry Elliott of The Guardian for reminding us all of that. The caricature of a startled looking Mr Darling was drawn when things all started to really go bad in the early part of this year. I thought he looked much more relaxed* in the pictures taken of him at his Western Isles get-away-from-it-all and published in this weekend’s Saturday Guardian. Lucky man.......

This all has the feel of collapsing masonry as the house that Gordon built falls apart. The Darling interview has, as you would expect, produced some sharp demands for Darling to be sacked. Having just seen this in the Mail on Sunday, I genuinely now feel that figures around Brown must have lost it completely. The thought of Ed Balls as Chancellor will do more than scare the horses. Apart...

Chancellor Alistair Darling is a menace to the British economy. Today Peter Garnham reports in the FT that his comments this week, as well as signs of a rift between Darling and Brown, have caused the pound to have dropped to a record low against the euro.Darling's 2008 budget has also contributed to the decline of British pubs. The rise in alcohol duty means that pubgowers are drinking one million fewer pints a day, according to the Campaign for Real Ale. By contrast, sales of cheap supermarket booze are booming. I'd rather have people sitting in a nice pub drinking than on a park bench or (in one case) standing around a trolley across the road from Sainsburys. I cannot understand why Darling did not tax alcohol sold in shops instead. There also is a campaign to ban him from every UK...

Oh what joy. Do click on THIS link to see Alistair Darling undergo 90 seconds of hell as he attempts to "clarify" his remarks in his Guardian interview by BBC Scottish Political Editor Brian Taylor. He's asked about his comment on Wendy Alexander being 'unlikeable' and ties himself up in knots. In his second evasive reply watch his bottom lip. It's quiver-tastic television.One other thing. I know we are supposed to be going back to the 1970s in a number of ways, but does Alistair Darling really need to grow Denis Healey's eyebrows...

It is difficult to work out exactly what Alistair Darling intended with his Guardian interview. I doubt he was deliberately attempting to undermine the government yet his claims undermine the heart of Brown's message that the fundamentals of the UK economy are strong and we are better placed to get through the economic storm than other countries. Well, Darling has just holed that argument...

We're all doomed. Photo by Murdo Macleod.Bruce Anderson, in the Indy, comments on Alistair Darling's "gaffe" at the weekend in predicting economic woe:Whoever thought that Alistair Darling would stand up to Gordon Brown? Mr Darling seemed designed for the role of Gordon's Greyfriars Bobby, the little dog which was so faithful to its master that it stood guard at his grave. But Mr Darling suddenly learned how to bite. Fed up with taking the blame for decisions which were forced upon him, he is determined to rescue some of his reputation from the wreckage. We now know that Alistair Darling believed all along that abolishing the 10p tax rate would be a disaster. He warned the PM; he was overridden. He now wants to set the record straight.Fair enough: and as one who has consistently described...

It was fitting that on the same weekend the BBC showed a tribute programme to the makers of 'Dad's Army' Chancellor Alistair Darling should issue his 'we're doomed' comments.In an interview with the Guardian Darling said that he felt the UK economy was in its worst shape since the second world war (the period in which 'Dad's Army' was set).It was a spectacular claim and one that has dominated the news agenda since it appeared on Friday evening. Indeed it's also lead to a flurry of people and media commentators rushing to disagree with the Chancellor's analysis, a point summed up well here.And as happens whenever politicians make what seem to be unguarded, brutally honest comments, it's understandable that thoughts turn to what should be read into this. Well I think there are four...

Alistair Darling’s interview has caused a bit of a kerfuffle. He said, among other things, that people are “pissed off” with the government, which is evidently true, and that economic conditions “are arguably the worst they’ve been in 60 years” – while this is the bluntest government assessment yet of the very real problems, that “arguably” surely bears the weight of a lot of hyperbole.Some think that this may turn out to be a “Geoffrey Howe moment” – an intervention by a former loyalist that could precipitate the PM’s downfall.Others think that, as these remarks may have undermined Gordon Brown’s imminent political strategy, the result will be Darling’s sacking in the predicted autumn reshuffle.I’m not convinced. Because another thing he said, most...

I've read Alistair Darling's interview in the Guardian and I've come to the following conclusion: Darling is a man in the know, a man who knows that very shortly the Labour party is going to tear itself apart in an attempt to fix its problems. Darling's interview follows this basic theme: Things are bad and are going to get worse, the people are pissed off with us and we are failing to communicate - whilst at the same time saying that he believes Gordon Brown can sort this whole mess out. This sounds like a man putting a foot firmly in both camps.There's going to be a battle and Darling wants to be one of those still standing when the dust settles. If Gordon hangs on to his position he can't be accused of not giving him his public support. However, should Brown get the boot he will be on...

Chancellor Alistair Darling defends comments to a newspaper in which he said the UK faces its worst economic crisis in 60...

The Guardian has an exclusive interview in Saturday’s magazine with the Chancellor, Alistair Darling: Britain is facing “arguably the worst” economic downturn in 60 years which will be “more profound and long-lasting” than people had expected, Alistair Darling, the chancellor, has told the Guardian today. In the government’s gravest assessment of the economy, which follows a warning...