This Labour government reminds me of a sunny day at the fair, as a schoolboy in the village of Mayfield in Sussex. The Wall of Death was greatly exciting; the bumper cars, thrilling! Candy floss and bowls of goldfish waiting to be won - a great day until I got to a stall with Super Prizes standing in rows.

The man running the stall was shouting to the crowd: "Roll up! Roll up! Everyone's a winner!" I paid my shilling and threw the hoop in the hope of winning a watch. The man continued shouting "Roll up! Roll up!
Everyone's a winner!" and then, seeing my hoop said, laconically: "You lose."

Alistair Darling, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, is thinking about putting ten billion pounds into the economy and cutting taxes by twenty billion "To get people spending and stimulate the economy."

Like many people, I'm out of step with this thinking. Although I do not profess to be an economist, if the injection of this money happened and I were in the unfortunate position of having a mortgage, a leased motor car, the outgoings of children/education/clothes and the usual gas, electricity, fuel, council tax, parking, speeding fines, banking and insurance and all the paraphernalia that we are told are must-haves
or you are 'nobody', I would use common sense, that rare commodity these days, and take advantage of this windfall to reduce my debts.

It would dawn on me that this roller-coaster of spending money I don't have has hit the buffers and there is no pleasure in 'owning' things that are not paid for. All one actually owns is the misery of trying to meet the
monthly payments to stop those assets from being repossessed and a large proportion of the public will come to this conclusion. I, for one, would certainly not rush down the High Street looking for something to
buy...