First he said that Britain wasn’t in recession. (Lies of course!) Then, when he admitted that it was, it was only because every other country in the world was in recession. (Lies of course!) Then he said that it was the best placed nation to lead the world out of recession because of his prudent management of the economy. (Lies, of course...unless by leading he means from behind, and after everyone else!)
Britain is the last of the G7 economies to emerge from economic decline. The slump, lasting six consecutive quarters, represents the UK’s worst recession since comparable records began in 1955. It is also a ridiculously slight emergence at an estimated growth rate of 0.1%.
So much for the financial genius of Mr Gordon “I’ve ended boom and bust” Brown.
According to the Times: There are growing fears that Britain could tip back into recession after figures showing that the economy staggered to growth at the end of last year. The tiny 0.1 per cent uplift achieved from October to December, far worse than most City economists expected, threw Labour and Conservative election tactics into confusion. Gordon Brown’s hopes of hailing a lasting recovery were dashed amid signs that the next three months could be as difficult as the last.
Conservative plans to promise immediate spending cuts also looked questionable as analysts suggested a double-dip recession, in which the economy moves out of negative growth briefly only to go back into a second downturn soon afterwards.
So it’s back to the drawing board for both of the major parties. (The SNP doesn’t count remember: Mr Murphy says so.)
But worse still: Sterling fell on foreign exchanges and fresh concerns were expressed over the government’s ability to tackle Britain’s budget deficit.
Bill Gross, co-founder of Pimco, which runs the world’s largest bond fund, urged investors to steer clear of UK government bonds. He wrote on his website: “Gilts are resting on a bed of nitroglycerine. High debt with the potential to devalue its currency present high risks for bond investors.”
Given that the finances of the UK have been in the hands of the same man for the last 13 years, is it not something of which he should be heartily ashamed? Has he not completely and utterly cocked up our whole financial situation and subjected us, and our children, to a hitherto unimagined debt?
Is he not a complete and utter failure, and the worst Prime Minister this country has ever had, bar none?
Britain is the last of the G7 economies to emerge from economic decline. The slump, lasting six consecutive quarters, represents the UK’s worst recession since comparable records began in 1955. It is also a ridiculously slight emergence at an estimated growth rate of 0.1%.
So much for the financial genius of Mr Gordon “I’ve ended boom and bust” Brown.
According to the Times: There are growing fears that Britain could tip back into recession after figures showing that the economy staggered to growth at the end of last year. The tiny 0.1 per cent uplift achieved from October to December, far worse than most City economists expected, threw Labour and Conservative election tactics into confusion. Gordon Brown’s hopes of hailing a lasting recovery were dashed amid signs that the next three months could be as difficult as the last.
Conservative plans to promise immediate spending cuts also looked questionable as analysts suggested a double-dip recession, in which the economy moves out of negative growth briefly only to go back into a second downturn soon afterwards.
So it’s back to the drawing board for both of the major parties. (The SNP doesn’t count remember: Mr Murphy says so.)
But worse still: Sterling fell on foreign exchanges and fresh concerns were expressed over the government’s ability to tackle Britain’s budget deficit.
Bill Gross, co-founder of Pimco, which runs the world’s largest bond fund, urged investors to steer clear of UK government bonds. He wrote on his website: “Gilts are resting on a bed of nitroglycerine. High debt with the potential to devalue its currency present high risks for bond investors.”
Given that the finances of the UK have been in the hands of the same man for the last 13 years, is it not something of which he should be heartily ashamed? Has he not completely and utterly cocked up our whole financial situation and subjected us, and our children, to a hitherto unimagined debt?
Is he not a complete and utter failure, and the worst Prime Minister this country has ever had, bar none?
Yeh I blogged on this too.
ReplyDeleteIt is pathetic isnt it all? Brown and this [unelected] cabinet government is becoming a carry on farce.
I'll nip over to your place tomorrow morning Dean and have a read... This arrived as I was shutting down for the night.
ReplyDeleteCarry ons were funny... I'd pay good money to get Hattie Jacques and Sid James, Kenneth Williams and Kenneth Connor into this instead of the cast of this cabinet.... They are as funny as a broken leg and an altogether different kind of cast!
Don't suppose you'll have him back when you go independent?
ReplyDeleteThe answer to your question is YES tris. How convenient that the NI question popped up this week too isn't it.
ReplyDeleteCertainly the worst I can remember. God help them in Northern Ireland now he is over there sorting that out.
ReplyDeleteQM: Not a chance. We're a small country. We welcome anyo9ne (well almost) but there is not enough room for his fat head. :¬)
ReplyDeleteDo what you want with him. I hear there are spare rooms at the Tower of London.
SR: Yes. Northern Ireland starts falling down yet again. Whenever that has happened in the recent past there has been Tony Blair who, for all his faults, was brilliant at getting people round a table and getting them to thrash out an agreement, and not letting them stop till he had one.
ReplyDeleteNow what have they got?
Their only hope is that Martin McGuiness and that wee man with the wife that prefers young lads to him (I forget his name but you’ll know who I mean), will be so sick of Brown's company that they will agree to anything, just to get rid of him back to England where he belongs.
However, it has given Brown the chance to look as if he’s being statesmanlike, clearing his desk and rushing off to sort out this problem. At least there, no one will be asking him how it feels to be leading from the rear.
How relieved the rest of the world must be to have Britain and Gordon in charge.
Munguin: As you say. I see that Mrs Clinton is taking an interest in the problems. Perhaps Sen Mitchell will be dispatched to see if he can bang their heads together.
ReplyDeleteYou do have to ask what kind of people is it that doesn’t want to have control over their own police force and their own law courts.
Do they have so little confidence in their own abilities that they need England to run these things for them?
Of course, Sinn Fein spotted a time of weakness in the First Minister and have exploited it, which is a pretty mean things to do. On the other hand, the First Minister’s good lady might have thought about that kind of thing when she was grooming teenagers for sex and forking out £50,000 of other people’s money to get it. Lord that boy was expensive!
Munguin
ReplyDeleteThe snp doesn't count well of course it dont the issue is a United Kingdom one to be dealt with at Westminster by the National partys.
the snp can be left to dealing with issues such as emptying your bins and suchlike same as any other minor town council.
as for the big important issues the snp is best Ignored.........
"Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College"
ReplyDeletewhere ignorance is bliss,
'Tis folly to be wise
Condemned alike to groan,
The tender for another's pain;
The unfeeling for his own.
Yet ah! why should they know their fate?
Since sorrow never comes too late,
And happiness too swiftly flies.
Thought would destroy their paradise.
No more; where ignorance is bliss,
'Tis folly to be wise
nam nos omnes quibus est alicunde aliquis obiectus labos, / omne quod est interea tempus prius quam id rescitumst lucrost
(If our path ahead is blocked with any trouble, all the time before we find it out is always pure gain);
Mr MixedPickle: I'm sorry are you commenting on the correct post here, because if you are I have no idea what you are talking about.
ReplyDeleteYou can always count on the cyclops to lie in that respect at least he is dependable. I know he has that annoying habit of putting his tounge in his cheek literally and now metaphorically as well. You get it all ways with Gordon.
ReplyDeleteOK so, we have a Quantitative Easing of £50 billion injected into the economy, really debt as has to be repaid or even sold on as it was not taken up, on a GDP of £315 billion in Q4. This is 1.5% or so of GDP and we have a GDP growth of 0.1% during a period of Max spend Xmas, VAT soon to rise back up again, subsidised cars and January sales starting in November and the index goes up by less than the level of confidence in the data and it is all provisional?
ReplyDeleteTwo consecutive quarters of negative growth is a recession but one of growth is out of recession.
Nuts
Goodness niko. Latin too. I had no idea I was in such educated company.... Ecci stercus pro cerebro habes!!! is all I remember from Latin....
ReplyDeleteBugger. It really is the most almighty mess, and already that puppet at number 11 has admitted that we may be back in recession next month.
ReplyDeleteClearly it has occurred to him that the Xmas sales and end of VAT reduction sales and January sales will have to come to an end sometime... and February’s credit card bills will meant that no one is spending....
It seems to me that the pain is only just beginning.....