Susanna Reid was more than happy to step in to defend Ed Balls after he was told he is 'wasted' at Good Morning Britain. The presenter was back at the helm of the ITV new programme alongside the former Labour MP on Tuesday (October 4) following Martin Lewis' regular stint on Monday.
During the latest show, Susanna and Ed were joined via video link by former politician Lord Jeffrey Archer who decided to give his thoughts on Ed's career change. Lord Archer was on the programme to chat about his new book, Next In Line, as well as his connections to the late Margaret Thatcher and the new Chancellor.
But Ed was soon grilling him on Prime Minister Liz Truss and questioned him on the differences between the country's new leader and former Conservative leader Margaret Thatcher as Truss hasn't shied away from her admiration of her late predecessor.
"Do you think Liz Truss is a Margaret Thatcher figure and do you think Margaret Thatcher would have ever done a U-turn in the way you've seen in the last 24 hours?" Ed asked to which Lord Archer replied: "She was famous for saying that she didn't do U-turns but I have great sympathy."
Susanna then moved on to ask Lord Archer what Truss' 'biggest mistake' was when she became Prime Minster after reeling off names of Conservative members who are 'not on side' amid calls for a general election from within her own party. "Taking it from your original question, I'm bound to say, no novelist would consider a Prime Minster being appointed on a Tuesday, Her Majesty dying on a Thursday, out of parliament, a funeral, and then a party conference," he replied.
"Any editor would have said, 'You can't put that lot together Jeffery, spread it out over a year'. So it became a big combustion in a short period of time."
But it wasn't long before Ed returned to his line of questioning on Margaret Thatcher. "If you take that famous 1980 speech, u-turn if you want to, at that point she was raising interest rates, she was cutting public borrowing, she was making tough, difficult, long-term decisions for the future of the country, it’s the opposite isn’t it?" Ed suggested
He continued to ask: "Can you imagine Margaret Thatcher saying in 1980, 'I will pay for tax cuts by an increase in public borrowing'. Isn’t that the opposite of what she did?" Lord Archer replied: "It is," but rather than continuing to answer the question, he changed his line of response and replied: "You know you’re wasted, Ed? You should be back in the House of Commons where you belong."
He went on to say: "You were Shadow Chancellor of course, and you’re frankly wasted waking me up at this time in the morning. I agreed to come on and talk about my book, Next In Line, which has just been published, not to chatter to you about why you’re not in parliament."
As Ed held up his book, Susanna replied; "To be fair, I'm not sure it was Ed Balls who was bemoaning the fact he's not still in Parliament," before swiftly moving on to mention the book's leading female character and linking it to his connections to the late Princess Diana.
Ed, 55, served as Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families from 2007 to 2010, and as Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer from 2011 to 2015. He is a retired member of the Labour Party and served as an MP for Normanton and later for Morley and Outwood between 2005 and 2015.
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