Coming up on the Peston podcast, I'll be looking at whether the Chancellor has done enough to at least dampen down the scourge

of unemployment that we're all fearing, expecting to an extent, and also at whether the incredible

amounts of money that the government is spending to get us through this crisis, 200 billion,

probably more than 200 billion is affordable.

I'll be talking to the former Labor Minister, Ed Balls, who knows a thing or two about

managing the public finances, to the former Tory Minister, Caroline Noakes, to the business secretary,

Alok Sharma, and I'm also going to be talking to Sir David King, a former chief scientific advisor who set up

something called Independent Sage, who's looking at the science of this awful crisis.

And I'm going to be talking to him about whether the prime minister was right to say what

he said about care homes not following the proper procedures.

I'm going to kick off and start talking about these economic announcements with Ed Balls,

who spent years in the Treasury before becoming Education Secretary and the Shadow Chancellor.

This was supposed to be all about softening the likely rise in unemployment.

How effective is it likely to be in your view?

Well, I don't think we know. And the problem for the Chancellor is the most important thing

is what's going to happen with the virus. Will there be a second wave?

Will we get things under control?

Will track and trace work?

And that's not really in his control.

I think the one thing we can say is that up to now,

the Treasury and the Bank of England have stood out as being very effective.

The chance of leadership has been strong in the last couple of months. On the health side, it's been poor for the government on the economy good. But I think this is now a gamble.

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