Pre-Budget Report

And nor do I believe that the right hon. and learned Gentleman can compare in any way the scale of what has happened in Britain or elsewhere to what has happened with Fannie Mae or Bear Stearns, or to the collapse of Lehman's or the present crisis at Citibank. Those institutions' power and financial clout are bigger than major economies such as the UK's. The Conservatives seem reluctant to face up to the fact that in 1997 the UK's GDP per head was the lowest in the G7. People in Britain were poorer and had less to spend than people in America, Japan, Germany, Italy, Canada or France. Now, of course, our GDP per head is the second highest, after the US. In the past decade, the UK has been the only G7 country to escape recession, and in that 10 years it has been the only major industrial economy to increase—from 7.5 per cent. to 8.25 per cent.—its share of global services. While Government borrowing peaked at 7.8 per cent. under the Conservatives, we brought it down to 1.2 per cent., and Labour's highest borrowing in the past decade was in fact lower than the average Conservative borrowing of 3.4 per cent.