Running sound public finances is the "most progressive thing" government can do because the poorest are always hardest hit in a recession, Chancellor George Osborne has insisted.
In his first Commons clash with new shadow chancellor John McDonnell, Mr Osborne insisted Labour had reached a position where they supported "borrowing forever".
The Chancellor urged MPs to back his revised Charter for Budget Responsibility, which would commit the Government to running an overall budget surplus by 2019.
Labour MPs have been whipped to vote against the plans following a U-turn by Mr McDonnell on Monday but a rebellion is expected in protest at the new party leadership's handling of the issue.
Moving the new charter, Mr Osborne told MPs: "The position adopted by Labour on this measure sends the wrong measure to the general public.
"The people who suffer most when governments lose control of the public finances are precisely the most vulnerable in society, they are precisely the people who lose their job, who get cast out of work.
"It's not the trade union barons who lose their jobs when the economy fails. It's not the richest in society who pay the price, it is the poorest in society and it is the most progressive thing a government can do to run a sound fiscal policy and provide financial stability to the working people of this country."
Former shadow chancellor Chris Leslie, who indicated before the 90 minute debate he would defy the whips to abstain, had intervened to warn: "I am very clear we should not turn our face against a surplus but wouldn't it be important that your definition of normal times safeguards some of our vital public services, makes sure we protect the most vulnerable in society.
"Isn't there a danger in automatically going for a surplus without protecting some of those very basics for society."
Labour's John Mann (Bassetlaw), who has also criticised his party's leadership this week, dubbed Mr Osborne's plans a "political gimmick".
But Mr Osborne insisted: "It's not a gimmick to have sound public finances."
The Chancellor continued: "The people who oppose this charter never want a surplus. They want to run a deficit forever, they never want Britain to be earning more than it spends.
"I'm setting a date, 2019, years from now at the end of this decade, nine years after the end of the recession - that is the date we are voting on. The truth is they want to borrow forever. They want to run a deficit forever. They believe our debts should rise and rise, not ever come down.
"And they just don't have the courage to admit it to the British people."
Mr Osborne added: "The truth is running a deficit forever is not socialist compassion it is economic cruelty and Britain wants no more of it."
The Chancellor says running a surplus in "normal times" was aimed "precisely" at ensuring there were resources available in inevitable economic downturns.
Green MP Caroline Lucas (Brighton Pavilion) intervened to insist borrowing should continue to invest in public services, prompting Mr Osborne to ask when she would run a surplus.
In remarks prompting noisy barracking, she said: "You stop borrowing when you can no longer afford to pay back.
"We can perfectly afford to pay back on our investments which is why economists are laughing at this."
After Speaker John Bercow intervened to calm the raucous Tory benches, Ms Lucas continued: "If we are investing in jobs that gets the taxes going back into the Revenue and that is good for the economy which is why economists are saying your silly trick is very bad economics even if it's clever politics to make all of your friends laugh a lot.
"People out in the country are not laughing because you are increasing austerity and increasing the burden on the poorest people."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel