Gordon Brown isn’t living in the real world

The UK’s property market is likely to recover quicker than those elsewhere because too few properties have been built recently, Gordon Brown has said.

The prime minister told a City audience the US and Spain had “overbuilt” homes during the years of rising prices.

In contrast the UK had “pent-up demand” because not enough had been built.

He said the UK problem was not shortage of demand for homes at “the right prices” but a shortage of mortgages “at the right prices for people to buy”.

Does anyone feel safe in Gordon Brown’s hands? He seems to consistently miss the point and then tries to sell his misinterpretation as a solution, all the while trying to whitewash his past that helped cause this crisis in the first place.

The UK property market is screwed and needs to stabilise at prices affordable to the general public. Trying to keep it at 2007 prices will mean that people will have to take out massive mortgages - except the banks won’t be too keen on giving them out any time soon. All the evidence is pointing to massive debt causing the problems we’re now facing and yet Brown seems to think that whatever worked for the boom will work for the bust.

I’m terrible with money and don’t pretend I understand finances but even I can see these proposed solutions are unlikely to work. How can someone who was the Chancellor of the Exchequer for 10 years and is now Prime Minister miss it?

Edit - looks like he might be trying to distract the public with proof of extra-terrestial intelligence. Maybe aliens have the solution to the credit crunch or they are in fact to blame, planning to invade after a sustained global recession.

Bookies William Hill have temporaily suspended their betting that the proof of the existence of intelligent extra terrestials will be confirmed by the serving Prime Minister following an extraordinary rush of bets, including one William Hill client looking to place a bet of £3,000.