Well, the government would have done better to read Fraser’s response to the fall in GDP before they went and blamed much of the 0.5% decrease on the inclement weather. Cue “Wrong kind of snow” jokes everywhere. And, frankly, Tories would be laughing all the way to the nearest TV studio had Gordon Brown ever suggested something similar.
Better, surely, to agree that the figures are disappointing but stress that they are the first and therefore somewhat provisional numbers that may well be revised in due course. Not a great line to sell but some days you take a beating and just make things worse by trying to wriggle out of it.
But what this shows, I think, is how Labour have benefited from Mrs Alan Johnson’s adventures. Mr Johnson, nice and decent and all the rest of it, was plainly not terribly interested in the Shadow Chancellor brief.
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