Gordon Brown was left embarrassed tonight after a political ally inadvertently echoed the Tory attack on his stewardship of the economy. Chile President Michelle Bachelet said her Government had been able to introduce a significant fiscal stimulus because it had "saved in the good times". Although the comments came as she praised the Prime Minister's leadership, it sounded uncomfortably like David Cameron's charge that he did not "fix the roof while the sun was shining".Crisis? What crisis? George Osborne said...
"I would say that because of our decision during the good times, we decided to save same of the money for the bad times," Ms Bachelet said at a joint press conference in Santiago. "And I would say that policy today is producing results. So when we develop our fiscal stimulus plan we could make one that is 2.8% of GDP."
Ms Bachelet went on to point out that the UK had managed to introduce a stimulus of more than 2% of GDP. However, Mr Brown felt he needed to respond by insisting that the International Monetary Fund believed Britain was better prepared than most countries for the downturn.
The episode was the latest difficulty to beset Mr Brown's tour ahead of next week's G20 summit in London, which was on its fourth and final leg.
A keynote speech to the European parliament in Strasbourg on Tuesday was overshadowed by a suggestion from Bank of England Governor Mervyn King that the UK may not be able to afford a further fiscal stimulus.
Then, as Mr Brown arrived in New York, Czech Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek laid into Barack Obama's fiscal stimulus package and financial bailout plans as "the way to hell". In Brazil yesterday, Mr Brown's call for a 100 US billion dollar package to help revive international trade was upstaged when his host President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, launched an excoriating attack on the "white, blue eyed people" who had caused the economic crisis.
The President of Chile is right to point out, as we have done, that countries that put aside money in the good years are the ones that can afford to spend that money now without adding recklessly to national debt. Gordon Brown is getting lessons from the Latin Americans about sound public finances. You couldn't make it up. It is because under Labour, Britain suffers the national embarrassment of having the biggest budget deficit by far of any G20 country.Not going well for Gordon, is it?
UPDATE: Strangely this wasn't covered on the BBC Ten O'Clock News. Perhaps someone should get a clip of the press conference and send it to Dan Hannan so he can put it on Youtube!
21 comments:
All the G20 Leaders will be looking at Gordon and sniggering next week.
They will be thinking ...
"Look what that stupid prat has done to the UK economy...
"even my 16 year old son is better with money than him"
Time to cut up the credit cards Gordon!!!
Strangely this wasn't covered on the BBC Ten O'Clock News.
Propaganda by omission,Iain?
This man is becoming an embarrassment to the country. His tenure as an unelected PM should cease and would cease if NoLab could find a replacement. The Tories must force an election by any means necessary.
If they don't there will be nothing left for them to inherit. Somebody has to shame him into resignation but the problem is that he has no shame and he is backed by the left wing Fabian ideologists. As we all know they are never wrong!
"Strangely this wasn't covered on the BBC Ten O'Clock News"..
No, but it was covered by that doyen of unbiased reporting, Nick Robinson on his Nick Robinson blog.
He opens with:
"Chile's President Michelle Bachelet has told Gordon Brown that her country put aside money in the good times in order to spend in the bad.
It is a boast with uncanny echoes of exactly what David Cameron says Britain should have done but did not."
According to Nick:
"The country set up two sovereign wealth funds to save and later invest the proceeds of that growth. The country has run a series of budget surpluses and wiped out its national debt. Fiscal responsibility is also enshrined in law."
People! People! It's CHILE for f*ck's sake!
It's South America, full of drug barons and cheap Cabernet Sauvignon.
It is a country which, until recently was a dictatorship and is now experiencing growth a 5% per year!
Brown cannot continue to pretend that Britain was well prepared for the recession. Labour spent and borrowed and stole, even during the good years.
And now, even Nick Robinson has had to admit the fact.
"Strangely this wasn't covered on the BBC Ten O'Clock News"..
Do you really expect anything else from Brown's Bullshit Corporation?
Radio 4 picked this up at 6pm. I was shocked to hear Pravda quote Chile saying to Gordon:
Eh? Whaasssup? You spenda all da money. Wesa blaady save it, innit.
You might like to know that Brazil also said "this is the fault of blue eyed white people" whilst Europe blames Anglo Saxon Greed
Now there's a story that would sell a few mags Iain....
'However, Mr Brown felt he needed to respond by insisting that the International Monetary Fund believed Britain was better prepared than most countries for the downturn.'
What, like we have automatic stabilizers that account for most of the increased spending? We can barely afford them, after your profligacy, let alone the dramatic extra debt expansion.
Gordon, I don't really mind you lying to us in Britain. We're used to it really, water off a duck's back, but don't lie to other world leaders in public. That really is pathetic.
We'd quite like HM Queen to have a reasonably respected country after you've gone. You're absolutely rubbish, please go.
Pickles really did make an arse of himself last night, Iain. Luckily no one on QT had a rope that could hold his weight.
The fat bastard
Well, there's one company that is going to have healthy profits this year - Nokia.
Indeed OH, Pickles made a right tit of himself but i do suspect it was a "let's nail a tory" moment from the impartial al-Beeb
Let's face it they are all throughing it but the BBC do love to twist the knife when it's a tory who's been snared.
Telly Tax Rebel
Mrs OH works in Clerkenwell and we live in Braintree ( another 30 mins from Brentwood). She doesn't need the tax payer to buy her a second home, FFS.
I boot her out of bed every morning at 7.30 so she can haul her arse to London and she's never late.
(Although booting Pickles out of bed every morning might take a JCB)
I'm not convinced that's such a great reaction from Osbourne. Especially the 'you couldn't make it up' part. Sounds worryingly patronising to what he called 'Latin America'. He should have hat-tipped Chile for their sound judgment at the very least.
Bad - really bad judgment.
The unraveling of Brown's diabolical interregnum has gained its own momentum, Macbeth style.
Osbourne should stick to principled high rhetoric, Hannan style.
And a plan (if he has one). He could try Hannan's, of course.
I wonder if he's even read it.
Gordon's Excellent Adventure appears to be heading into Bogus Journey territory.
Which, given he comes across as a robot, seems rather apropos.
Ha ha. Cable was right on one thing he has turned into a Mr Bean character.
Gordon must think I'm his quiet moments. Was I really responsible for this. Oh cringe I was. I really £ucked up the economy. He spent so much of his time scheming on stealth taxes and investing in building a larger labour voted ( is gvnmt jobs and tax credits) he completely took his eye off the real economy.
I don't really think the line about saving for the bad years is as viable as he simply over spent on government managers. I don't think knocking the banks is viable either. I was arguing 9 years ago - during the eclipse - that interest rates were too low we were becoming dependent on a variable that would be forced up when inflation took off. All those people who argued for low interest (consumer types) are now knocking the banks fir their own greed.
Back in the 80 s and 90s financial advisers were only allowed to quote 7 and 12? Percent interest on endowment mortgage projections. It was the opposite problem of wanting high interest rates that got consumers into debt. So if any body is Reading this what's important is to get lending rates right so that people can still afford repayments if rates go up BUT if rates go down can still reach their target savings.
Perhaps Brown could do no worse than to order our troops in Afghanistan to safeguard the poppy fields and secure them so that we can harvest the money from the cocaine?
Perhaps that is why he is South America, setting up the network?
'However, Mr Brown felt he needed to respond by insisting that the International Monetary Fund believed Britain was better prepared than most countries for the downturn.'
WTF!!!
The IMF have done nothing but crap all over Britain for the past year. They have never said anything of the kind. Brown is the only one to say that. The man is truly deranged. Get the men in white coats!
Strapworld, good idea, but it's heroin not cocaine fron 'Stan.
More seriously, I do not understand why the legal drugs companies such as Glaxo are not in there buying up the entire harvest and cutting the illegals out of it.
The Penguin
The BBC offer a sanitised version of the news. ITV is more straightforward.
In an interview on Thursday night ITV's News at Ten reporter tore into some senior copper on the Kirk Reid rape cases. The copper was saying that they've improved operationally and the reporter pointed out that they clearly hadn't.
During the commercials I flicked over to BBC in time to see the BBC version, they just read out a Met press release along the lines of "lessons must be learned".
I wasn't surprised - disgusted but not surprised.
I really don't understand why Dave doesn't speak out about this disgraceful abuse of taxpayers money by the unaccountable BBC.
Josh@8:40 said:
'The man is truly deranged. Get the men in white coats!'
Kitty Usher repeated the same lie as Brown on 'Any Questions' today.
I keep my Nokia away from the TV and the Radio in case this kind of thing happens. Chris Grayling gave a good measured reply.
I have really become so disillusioned with Labour that I get furious with the pious posturing and what looks like outright lying that Brown indulges in. I was also as it happens looking for some reporting re-Chilean President. What on earth is going on in this country? Brown can lie about the IMF and it's ignored!When the Labour party is asked in this country about the dire predictions of the same body they rubbish the organisation and tell us how wrong the IMF often is. Someone is definitely not well here.
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