The downturn is all Brown's fault

BATTEN down the hatches. Get the tin hat on. Despite the best efforts of various soothsayers to tell us the looming economic downturn will not hit us folks in the Edinburgh area, let me tell you now that we will all be affected – and it's not going to be pretty.

I have no doubt that the smooth supercharged V8 engine that is the Edinburgh economy will give us the torque to help us pull through, but as is usual, the poorest and the weakest will find it hardest.

Those in marginal jobs where savings can be made by employers, those who are already struggling to pay their store and credit cards, those who have bargained on their property rising in value just as the market is cooling off, those on fixed incomes and without savings to tide them over; all will face challenges and many will need help.

Sadly, thanks to Gordon Brown's arrogance, they are now finding out that instead of being able to help them through the difficult times the Government is doing its best to make it tougher.

This should come as no surprise, for Gordon Brown's government will not be able to offer solutions until it faces up to the fact that it is responsible for many of the problems.

Only this week we had his economic holiness, our Prime Minister, going to the United States to try and urge a co- ordinated response – the subtext for this exercise being that it's all the fault of greedy rapacious US capitalism and we are mere innocent bystanders.

Brown is in denial – he has a great deal to answer for.

In the United States there is a consensus around the need for lower interest rates to be helped by tax cuts for those that will reinvest such savings back into the economy or work harder – let's call them the aspirational classes.

In Britain the situation is quite different. The Bank of England has lowered interest rates but Messrs Brown, Darling and Co cannot deliver any tax cuts – those that have been announced are illusory, funded by tax rises elsewhere, and most heinous of all, falling on the poorest, who have seen their 10p tax rate disappear while duties on booze and fags climb higher.

Britain's economic woes are chiefly of our own making. After enduring the necessary pain of the 80s, the deregulation, rationalisation, competition and tax-cutting delivered a country fit to take on the world again – and we did.

Brown's alleged success – the high employment, low inflation and improving standards of living were born out of the costly but solid foundations built before he arrived.

Since then he has massively increased public expenditure, saddled us with higher taxes to pay for it and then borrowed to the hilt when his tax takings encountered the law of diminishing returns.

Our economic growth was fuelled by high property prices that fed a credit boom. All the Americans have done is provide the pin to prick his balloon. Brown said boom and bust was a thing of the past. Well, it never really went away. How these words could haunt him.

Gordon Brown and humility are not often on the same menu, but until he coughs for the failure of his economic strategy, why should we believe he is the man to help us out of the quagmire?

Odeon needs dignity
The snaking queues that formed for The Sound of Music, the Edinburgh premiere of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Roxy Music (in the days of Brian Eno), the Average White Band, Deep Purple, Black Sabbath and the Commodores (with Lionel Ritchie) – all bring back fond, fond memories of the Odeon in South Clerk Street in my youth.

It would be sad to see it end up as flats or a hotel, with just the graceful 30s façade to remind us of what once was.

Still, for me, it was never the same once it was boxed up into many smaller screens, and I hardly ever went after that. I agree with the Scottish Architectural Heritage Society of Scotland – if the Odeon cannot be returned to its awesome 2000-seater auditorium, it is of no architectural significance and should be allowed to go with some dignity.

Compare and contrast
New Year greetings cards sent by Lothian and Borders Police to offenders with outstanding fines and warrants were so successful they considered a similar scheme for Valentines Day, but chose Easter instead. I suggest they do Hallowe'en too.

Contrast this customer-friendly approach with the council litter patrol which came down heavy-handed with threats of fines to Baguette Express.

The Shandwick Place business, suffering like all the rest on the street while the road is closed to traffic for tram works, pointed out that workmen had removed the public litter bins.

Maybe the council should try and apprehend the litter louts instead of the shopkeepers who are more in need of some TLC – and a "get well soon" card.