It's not as though he was Chancellor of the Exchequer for the previous 10 years before becoming PM, it it?

"Gordon Brown is not entirely responsible for the state of the UK economy, he just inherited an unsustainable position,"

Sorry, but it seems to me that everyone forgets that before he was PM, Gordon Brown was Chancellor for TEN years. If the chancellor isn't responsible for the economy who is????

AC - Because you never know when the 'Great Leader' might be listening.

Erm so which cabinet post did he hold before *cough* we elected *cough* him prime minister?

Sarin, Colao, Bond... Do you need a weird name to be at the top in Vodafone?

I guess Sarin's leaving is because Vodafone wants to come back to Japan. It had been hard with a boss with that name... "Ah, Mr. Yamata, let me introduce you Sarin..." "WHAT???"

Come on now, let's not forget no more cycle of boom and bust from the Iron Chancellor. It must be true, he said it often enough, although curiously not often of late.

Stop sign as it represents the most positive forecast for the British economy over the next couple of years.

.... among the Triffids* in Vodafone Group......

*Mobile Vegetables

|we didn't elect him prime minister."

Correct, though by my simple reconing, we don't directly elect prime ministers anyway.

Pretty sure we elect our local representative in parliament, and the party with the most representation get's to have a 1st or "prime" minister.

The fact that TB behaved like a president and made it more about personality* then policy shouldn't be either here or there.

I will agree that GB appears to be lacking a "stateman" quality.

This is technically true, but hasn't represented reality for many years, if it ever did. Government in this country is top down. The PM and his circle set the party line and the MPs are expected to toe it, including on local matters.

When someone elects their MP according to what the leadership candidate says, they aren't going against how politics works in this country, only how it's supposed to work. Which is entirely rational.

So yes, having an unelected prime minister, who plans on holding office for more than a short caretaker period, and refuses to hold a general election to give himself legitimacy, is an absolutely hideous state of affairs.

Paris Hilton wonders where the Vodafone angle is.

I really am fed up with this trite little argument about not directly electing "Prime" Ministers. Whilst we may not get a direct choice we all know damn well who it'll be before we put our 'X' in the box. Are you seriously trying to suggest that it came as a surprise to you when Tony Blair became PM? If not, your argument doesn’t hold any water.

And as I'm on a role anyway, if you want to get all pedantic about "Prime" Minister the original, correct term is First Lord of The Treasury.

> The fact that the house price bubble is bursting (and rightly so) due to

> incompetent investment bankers is hardly down to Gordon Brown

so nothing to do with Brown, who's policies encouraged the housing / debt bubble to keep people feeling affluent while he raises taxes in the background to keep his tax and spend rubbish alive

And when the economy turned people couldn't clear their 'debt' by sticking it on their house so easily and are trying to live within their income and finding that a huge chunk is disappearing to the government and ends they thought met dont

The general public aren't the only ones having this problem coming out of a 'feel good' economy, the people who we're meant to be managing it are having the same problems, wanting to raise taxes to make up a shortfall but realising that its political suicide at the moment. Wishing that they kept some back during the goodtimes for the moment when the economy did slow