Tories: We offer constructive support

Tuesday, 07, Oct 2008 12:00

George Osborne, shadow chancellor, comments on the global market collapse:

"If the banking system fails, it's not just the banks that go bust.

"Businesses fail. Families can't get mortgages. People lose their jobs – not just in the banks but across the wider economy.

"The prime minister said we’d never see a return to 15 per cent interest rates – well this week one of our high street banks has written to many of its small business customers increasing their interest rate to 15.8 per cent.

"All of us need to work together to stop Britain sliding from a banking crisis into a deep recession.

"Of course, constructive support does not mean we are suspending our critical faculties.

"We will return at a later date to ask how on earth Britain found itself, at the end of this age of irresponsibility, with more personal and public borrowing than any other advanced economy in the world."