Heard Peter Allen talking (18:24) about how the US and German economies were doing so much better than ours….because, Allen tells us, they didn’t have ‘austerity’…the ‘big cuts’…..we may be improving here…but you know what, says Allen…not so much…nowhere near where we were in 2007…..em….wasn’t that just about to go bust in the biggest crash in history!!
Got his backside kicked by the guest, who knew what he was talking about.
Germany of course was never in the bad position that the UK was in in the first place because it didn’t spend vast amounts of money in the good times.
The US’s first solution didn’t work…that is the much vaunted stimulus…Plan B in UK talk.
What did work?….well for one thing it wasn’t shackled to the Euro Zone like the UK is…the Euro Zone just doesn’t make sense…one of the reasons Britain is doing so well is because it’s not in the Euro Zone…and of course there’s shale gas making their industry so much more low cost.
Allen deflated pretty quickly…..guess the new ‘current affairs’ brief from the BBC Trust to be relevant, significant and insightful might be targeted at him.
Or it could be directed at the BBC’s economics ‘expert’ Evan Davis who a couple of weeks ago thought that ‘since 2010’ (when all things bad began for the BBC) the tax regime had become very light touch and allowed companies to get away with murder…hence the tax gap ‘increasing’.
Once again a BBC talking head got his backside kicked….the real expert put him right…the tax regime is in fact harsher than ever…..and the tax gap isn’t ‘bigger’ as the economy is itself bigger. The tax gap has in fact gone down percentagewise.
The BBC does seem to make a determined effort to play down any economic good news…whether it’s employment or GDP growth or exports or consumer sales or house prices rising…..there’s always a downside.
Still I’m sure if the moribund Miliband gets in they’ll be just the same.
I assume that your last sentence is ironic! You missed out Peston throwing doubt on the usefulness of GDP figures. Once again an expert put him right by saying that whilst GDP figures weren’t the be all and end all they were one of the most important indicators of the state of country’s economic health and that currently things looked very promising.
The BBC are getting desperate because Labour’s chances at the next election are slowly disappearing under this tidal wave of good economic news and the inability of Miliband to persuade people that he could run a whelk stall, let alone a country. Dan Hodges caused a sharp intake of breath on the Daily Politics when he said that Miliband was in effect a liability for Labour and needed to be hidden from public view. Will we see a change in tack from the BBC ? Will they stop promoting Red Ed at every opportunity and relegate him to a sort of remote mystical sage role , for which he is very suitable as long as no one listens to him.
Peston would be absolutely right to pour scorn on the use of GDP figures as a real indicator of national prosperity.
GDP per head might be more welcome.
However, the inconsistency is that for a decade they relied on this figure for their reporting without any question at all, when GDP per head figures were probably falling due to mass working age immigration.
I don’t agree that Labours chances are slowly disappearing, the polls show that they are maintaining a steady 6 point lead.
Granted that this should lead to an effect on the Labour lead, but there’s a lag behind the figures going up or down and the effect on workers. It might have come too late.
Add to that the fact that David Cameron REALLY doesn’t want to be re-elected and there’s a pretty good chance that Millipede minor will be the next prime minister.
It is reported that last year Millipede major made over £1 million in speaking engagements, and if a non entity like him can make that kind of money, then how much would Cameron be likely to make?
The problem is that he can’t do it while he’s still prime ministers and for a man whose only motivation is personal gain then there’s no way he will want to stay in office.
He has got the public sector vote, the immigrant vote the postal vote and unequal constituencies a six percent advantage will be enough, am I to old to emigrate?
The Millipeed also gets 40 “free” seats from the “Scottish Peoples Socialist Republic ” ,unless things can change in September, the West Lothian Question ,disadvantage Max , to the English .
Indeed, there is no way Millipede could run a whelk stall. He would need to manage his perishable stock, he would need to find a good pitch, he would need to interact with real people, he would need to deal with council jobsworths and the full panoply of the state he loves so much, he would actually have to risk his own money rather than picking up a huge pay packet every month as if by magic because he is so fantastic. No, there is no way on earth that this pampered little socialist prince could ever dirty his hands and run a real business like a whelk stall.
I get the impression that large swathes of the population now reckon that none of the politicians in the major parties could run a whelk stall.
Or – “would you buy a second-hand car from any of these clowns ?”
And indeed they’d be right. Nor, for that matter, could any of the BBC’s ‘business’ experts, nor could the ‘executives’ responsible for running the BBC itself (witness the recent digital debacle)..
It’s a sad characteristic of this country that our ruling elites seem always to be in power despite their qualities, not because of them.
It really makes me angry when the economic news is that the UK economy is bouncing back better than any other EU country and the BBC and other media come across with the comments that people do not ‘feel’ better off. So there must be something wrong with the statistics.
The ‘figures’ are wrong for economics as the ‘people’ don’t feel better off. However they are right for recorded, crime and the benefits of mass immigration, despite the ‘people’ not feeling better off!
Pick your agenda and tailor your reporting accordingly.
Peter Allen comes over as a somewhat blokey southerner – and not very diverse at that – no wonder he feels the need to peddle evr leftward in an effort to keep up with the rest of the BBC Salford circus performers.
A Radio 4 wannabe his number never seemed to come up – not posh or Scotch enough, or female or gay or Muslim enough one guesses. These things seem to be of paramount importance at our BBC.
Or Oirish – either side of the border.
How come John Redwood has interruptions and a French socialist Eurocrat up against him, as he argues against the Tobin Tax being forced on EU nations?( Today 8.45 or so 30/4/14)?
Whereas Blunketts absurd Labour plans to add extra layers of State bureaucracy to ensure the strangulation of Goves reforms get no opposing voice in the previous “piece”?
Nor indeed did Ken Clarkes torrent of crap about UKIP being “frit” of standing for Newark earlier….John Humphrys happy to feed him his “critics might say” grapeshot , then let Clarke chunder on unopposed!
Got to be some research here-pretty clear to me when “opposing voices” get “invited onto the show”-as opposed to a free run at furthering the BBC journalists “aspirations” for Marx or Miliband…one bleeds seamlessly into the other.
Yes, Fatty Clarke was allowed free rein with his lies, such as Ukip would expel French hedge fund managers from London, or that there are more British people working (he did not say living, ie retirees) in Europe than EU nationals working in Britain. But then what can you expect from a complacent bucket of lard who never even bothered to read the Maastricht Treaty?
Since he had just accused Fararage of telling lies, I thought that was pretty rich and that Nigel might get to come back on that. It would however appear that someone had stipulated they must be interviewed separately and I’d put good money that it was Cuddly Ken who was frit.
I could never understand why on earth Cameron wanted him on his team.
Keep your friends close – and your enemies closer.
Didn’t hear this one, Chris, but heard the Green/Portes ‘interview’ earlier.
Sounds like the old BBC trick – effectively the right-wing guest being grilled/interrupted/challenged in a two-pronged attack – used twice in the same programme. The BBC are getting more brazen by the day with their Leftist bias.
Yep, the self-same BBC that loves to push the line about a ‘Country Called Europe’ has suddenly started getting all Klein Deutschlander on us. What can it all mean?
No doubt if the German economy hits the wall, we’ll be hearing a lot about how Britain is growing more slowly than Bavaria, Munich or the pub next to Bayern’s ground.
Oh, I dunno. After last night the pub next to Bayern’s ground is probably doing very brisk business.
Indeed! Last night from about 8.45pm onwards, I’d guess.
…not to mention sales of San Miguel in SW London tonight.