Ed Balls was left furious as Labour MP Darren Jones vehemently defended Rachel Reeves on the ITV show.
Good Morning Britain host Ed Balls fumed at Labour MP Darren Jones over his defence of Rachel Reeves after backlash from the budget last week. Susanna Reid and Ed welcomed the MP on their show this morning and questioned him about Reeves’ statements regarding the state of the country’s finances. Reid said: “She’d already received the forecast from the OBR, and it said she had £4.2 billion to spare. Was she misleading us that morning?”
To which Jones told her: “No, there are a couple of things relevant to this,” and continued to explain that the £4.2 billion was “unallocated” and they wanted to increase that number. He added: “Rachel was then also referring to the productivity review, how effective the economy is at producing wealth, and it had looked backwards at the last 10 years under the last government, it had been too optimistic.”
But Balls immediately interjected as he fumed at the MP for “dismissing” them.
Ed wasn’t happy with the Labour MP (Image: ITV)
He fumed: “I just wonder whether it’s wise for you to just dismiss this and say no, and that we are all wrong. I’ve been involved with lots of budgets, but I found it very hard to understand what was happening at the time, which for me is jarring.”
Balls continued: “There’s lots of people in the public who think this. What I don’t understand is why have they raised taxes in such a large way to spend on other things when we were told there wasn’t any money in the pot?
“You just say, no! We’re all wrong.” Jones continued: “I’m not suggesting that you’re wrong Ed or that anyone else is wrong, I’m just explaining –“, but Balls interjected once again and said: “No, you’re wrong! You said.”
Jones responded to say the question had been wrong, he said: “Rachel wasn’t misleading the country, but I’m not suggesting that–” before Balls interjected once again to fume it was the right question.
He said: “When you say no, the question is wrong, we just feel like you’re dismissing us.” But Jones stood his ground that he was just trying to explain the process.
Susanna then chimed in and said: “It is not normal for the Chancellor, a couple of weeks before the budget, to have an emergency press conference live on air during breakfast television viewing, which sends a message to the public, to the voters, it’s far worse than I feared and you are all going to have to tighten your belts as a result. That is not normal. It sent a message that you’re saying was not sent. I’m not sure that’s what voters and viewers will accept from you.”
GMB continues weekdays from 6am.
