Newspapers understate the borrowing by reporting government spin
I have been reading the Sunday papers about the economy and wonder why I bother to. Several of them rightly condemn the government for borrowing too much, but they all use Ministers’ own figures in the press releases and budget statement rather than reading the much larger and doubtless more accurate figures they had to put out in the small print of the budget book.
They tell us brrowing will reach 8% of National Income next year. Wakey,Wakey. The PBR book shows the government is already borrowing more than 10% of National Income this year. You can’t leave out all the borrowing to buy banks and bank shares, as the Chancellor did in his misleading presentation. The Chancellor said he would borrow a large £78 billion this year. His supporting book says it will be an eye watering £157 billion. Why can’t journalists report these simple and worrying facts?
If Economics editors and Business leader writers can’t be bothered to read the detailed 200 plus pages of the PBR they could at least read this thread to avoid these howlers.
They should know by now you cannot trust Ministerial figures.
|
