FactCheck: saving the world?
Updated on 12 December 2008
The PM made an embarrassing gaffe this week, but is a minister trying to rewrite history?
The claim
"What Gordon said yesterday at prime minister's questions was that he was saving the world banking system."
Jim Knight, schools minister, Question Time, BBC One, 11 December 2008
The background
Unflash Gordon, saviour of the economy. At least, that's what Labour would like us to think after an autumn in which it unveiled a huge bank recapitalisation plan and an emergency budget which rewrote the public finance rules.
But Gordon Brown made an embarrassing slip-up in parliament this week, in which he appeared to boast about saving the world.
Last night on Question Time, Jim Knight rallied to the PM's cause in response to a question on whether Brown was saving the world, saving the British banking system, or just saving himself.
"What Gordon said yesterday at prime minister's questions was that he was saving the world banking system," started the minister.
"We heard it Jim - he did not!," butted in Conservative MP Nadine Dorries, who was also on the panel.
"No, I watched it again today, you lot may have been so busy guffawing that you failed to listen to what he actually said," Knight insisted.
"He stuttered slightly over saving the world, but he said saving the world's banking system," he asserted again, to mutters of "I don't believe this" from Dorries.
So what did Brown actually say?
The analysis
Unfortunately for the PM, the evidence is here on video:
Brown starts soberly: "The first point of recapitalisation was to save banks that would otherwise have collapsed."
But then comes the killer slip: "And we not only saved the world, er, saved the banks and saved the... banks and led the way. We not only saved the banks..."
At this point opposition jeers halt proceedings until the speaker calls for order. After a few seconds' pause, Brown finally gets out a complete sentence: "We not only worked with other countries to save the world's banking system."
The verdict
Critics would say - gleefully - that Brown made a Freudian slip. Supporters would say he made an understandable slip of the tongue on which MPs unfairly pounced.
It's hard to see it as intentional - not even the most hyperactive of credible spin doctors would advise Brown to go around boasting to have saved the world, and he did move straight on to talking about the banking system.
But if anything his continued straight delivery, rather than an acknowledgement of the mistake or joke out of it, made it worse.
Brown did eventually say, as Knight insisted last night, that he had saved the world's banking system, and this may well have been his intention all along.
But unfortunately this wasn't all he said, and so any attempt to gloss over the slip-up will also be met by detractors with incredulity.
FactCheck rating: 2
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The sources
Question Time, 11 December 2008 (relevant quotes around 15 mins in)
Prime Minister's Questions,10 December 2008
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