David Prosser: No reason for King to feel embarrassed

Outlook Enough already, David Blanchflower. The determination of this former member of the Monetary Policy Committee to publicly attack Mervyn King at every opportunity was tedious even before he demanded the resignation of the Bank of England Governor yesterday following the Wikileaks revelations. This latest intervention is just low.

There are indeed doubts about whether Mr King has been a little too political in his interventions on fiscal policy of late – Adam Posen, the MPC member who has to a great extent taken on Mr Blanchflower's mantle on the committee, said as much in a Treasury Select Committee hearing last week.

That debate will continue. Still, the Wikileaks disclosures seem to consist of the news that Mr King told the Tories they ought to draw up some detailed plans for reducing the deficit and that he worried about their inexperience.

Is Mr Blanchflower really suggesting that these are hanging offences? Opposition politicians always meet the Bank's Governor in the run-up to an election and it would have been odd had Mr King not told David Cameron and George Osborne that they would be wise to present the markets with a detailed breakdown of their intentions. Almost as surprising as it would have been had Mr King not had some concern about two men with no ministerial experience taking charge of an economy at a time of unprecedented peacetime challenges.