But just as some media relish the chance to say somebody they don’t like ‘has a history of mental illness’, so with Ed we can easily evidence a history of balls. Did you know that:

* The root-and-branch Socialist tub-thumper went to a private boys school in Nottingham

* He’s yet another Oxymoron – studied PPE at Keble

* While there, he joined both the Labour and Tory associations. “I was there from 1984-87, and at that time Ed Balls was also a member of OUCA,” says Philip Hollobone, a contemporary, “It was well before he was famous, but I was secretary for one term and distinctly recall the name”.

* Having used the depth of ‘Thatcher cuts’ as a scare tactic in this election, in December 2007 Balls played a different tune when addressing the Daily Mail’s readership: “ she was a role model for women to see that you could reach the highest job” he enthused.

* Ed once told an audience that “ Margaret Thatcher was the first prime minister to be a woman in our country”. Such perception.



*On the same day he made that speech, Ed predicted “Gordon Brown will overcome his troubles to stage a winning general election comeback”. Such foresight.

* In September 2007, with his wife Yvette Cooper (she is cosily esconced in the neighbouring constituency) Ed was accused of “breaking the spirit of Commons rules” by using MPs’ allowances to help pay for a £655,000 home in north London. It was alleged that they bought a four-bed house in north London, and registered this as their second home (rather than their home in West Yorkshire) in order to qualify for up to £44,000 a year to subsidise a reported £438,000 mortgage under the Commons Additional Costs Allowance. This was despite both spouses working in London full-time and their children attending local London schools.

* Relatively few people are aware of the role that Ed Balls played in the scandal surounding Gordon Brown’s favourite think-tank, The Smith Institute. TSI (named after Labour Leader John Smith) has allegedly been in breach of the charity laws covering party political activity on several occasions.

* Following a Charity Commission investigation initiated by the Sunlight Centre for Open Politics, the board of the Smith Institute ‘charity’ had to resign.

* In the year between leaving the Treasury as Brown’s Special Adviser and becoming an MP, Ed Balls was paid close to £89,000 to write just 2 (two) pamphlets for the Smith Institute.

Ed Balls is an idiot, but it’s good to know that we are also parting company with an MP who is a corrupt, bandwagon-jumping, double-standards hypocrite from the same tired old elite that has been busy ruining Britain since the 1970s.