Britannia Radio

The man is a liar, a cheat and snake-oil salesman.

Brown has cooked the books again.  He's always doing it.  He 'sent 
for his fiddlers three'.   Why aren't the opposition more awake ?   
If Fraser Nelson can alert everyone to the possibility - er - 
likelihood - why doesn't som body on those benches pay attention ?

The previous figure was a fiddle anyway so the new one is a double-
fiddle - a fiddle on a fiddle.
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COFFEE HOUSE Spectator Blog  20.10.08
Making Northern Rock disappear
FRASER NELSON 6:43pm

He's done it. I blogged a while ago about how Gordon Brown lost his 
battle to have Northern Rock struck off the books, causing trouble 
for his oft-repeated Brownie that he has reduced debt from 43% to 37% 
of GDP. In August, the ONS showed National Debt was 43.3% - and had 
actually been at those levels for a year. So what was Brown to do? 
Last week, I reported a rumour that he'd ordered up a new debt series 
to exclude NR. I said something daft at the time, like "he couldn't - 
could he?" Well, he did - and in fact he had by the time I blogged.

There is now a new measure entitled "National Debt excluding Northern 
Rock," code HF6W. It shows the figures Brown needs - 43% to 37% - 
thus helping him claim he can afford the bank bailout. And he'll be 
repeating it non stop. I smelled a rat when Harriet Harman used the 
37% figure in the Commons. Brown is careful with his Brownies - and 
her mentioning it in parliament indicated that a new debt series had 
indeed been born. As so often, I underestimated him.

His new debt series has already replaced National Debt (RUTO, may it 
rest in peace) by HM Treasury in its monthly data series. So - 
presto! At the stroke of a statistician's pen, Northern Rock has 
vanished. Now Brown can get back to lecturing the banks about their 
immoral methods of debt concealment and lack of transparency.