Blogging from the Tory conference on Monday, John Harris filed a thought-provoking piece for the Guardian's Comment is Free page (http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/sep/29/georgeosborne.economy ).
Harris rightly noted that the Tories are making all the political capital that's possible over Labour's not so tacit approval of the cheap credit boom in the 90s which has now collapsed so spectacularly. Harris did, however, point out that the relaxation of credit controls happened on Thatcher's watch (I recall some trade unions, my own included, offering credit card deals to their low-paid members in the late 80s).
Returning to the current situation, though, Harris observed, "The Blair & Brown governments were presumably scared of going near the issue of personal debt for fear of blowing the gaffe on their own boom and appearing to tell the voters off for their lack of financial discipline, something [George] Osborne seems to have just about avoided so far."
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