Let's not meet again
THE prime beneficiary of the strong well, stronger — pound is Gordon Brown. He can scarcely touch the runway at Heathrow without taking off again. He came back on Monday evening from Brus- sels, looked in at the Treasury, and on Wednesday flew off to Luxembourg to talk to Jean-Claude Juncker, the prime minis- ter, about employment. Since Mr Juncker's country is about the size of Rutland and relies for its employment on Eurocracy, its experience may not be representative. This is Mr Brown's sixth trip abroad since he took office, and follows three meetings of European finance ministers, one summit in Amsterdam and one in Denver. At least he ducked the Nato summit and the earth summit, unlike Tony Blair, who has, I see, flown 26,800 miles since taking office. Mr Brown will be even more of a frequent flyer now, as the pressures build up, with Britain next in line for the European presidency and preparing for the Group of Seven to move on from Denver to Birmingham. Time spent on this ministerial tennis circuit is time not spent in the office, where Mr Brown, I would have thought, has quite enough to do. His budget had to be put off, and was none the better for it. He would do himself and us a favour if he wrote a self- destruct mechanism into the agenda of these gabfests: Let's not meet again. It is no consolation that he can now afford to buy the drinks when he gets there.
Previous page
