The Economy

As for the comparison with Greece, does the hon. Gentleman recognise that if we had followed the advice of the Chancellor when the recession struck back in 2008, although events here might not have followed what happened in Greece, they would quite probably have followed what happened in Ireland, which saw huge public spending cuts? Ireland went into a cycle of more and more cuts, and more and more people being put out of work. The result of those cuts was not that Ireland's deficit shrank, but that public services and poverty got worse.