Rachel Reeves may have a considerable intellect. Her ability at chess and jobs as an economist at the Bank of England and elsewhere point to it. But competence in one or several areas does not guarantee it in others.
To say the jury is out on her role as Shadow Chancellor would perhaps be a little kind.
Gordon Brown’s ‘no return to boom and bust’ ultimately did not work because that is not how capitalism works, as old marxists with beards told him. Even so Brown was addressing an important social democratic aspiration. Namely that a key reason people vote Labour is the expectation that it will temper just a bit ‘red in tooth and claw’ capitalism. That means some effort to make sure that a market economy does not lead to a market society (as it currently has).
Below is a line from Rachel Reeves speech at the Labour business forum held at the Oval on 1st February (New Statesman)
On stage, Reeves agreed that “a market economy thrives on risk, on daring, on leaps into the unknown’
So what does she plan to do about that? I may have misunderstood but I rather suspect, she celebrates it.
Leave a Reply