Friday 29 January 2010

Loan sharks

I am not one to say "I told you so" but I told you so. The case for Umbrella Investment is proven. The Umbrellabuilders fund, which enables people in especially soggy parts of England to borrow brollies, has reached capacity. We have had to close it 14 years ahead of schedule. So successful have we been in meeting the government's main KPI of being seen to be doing something quickly that we have run out of umbrellas to lend. And the government can quote a positive headline figure of huge umbrella infrastructure investment just ahead of the election.

Never mind evaluating the impact of the loans we have made, which you would think would be the true point at which we could determine whether or not we had been successful. Let's assume it's a done deal and pat ourselves on our smug backs.

This proves there is an appetite for loans and if the metric of success is demand then we are golden, baby. That there is such demand shows that umbrella investment is the new sliced bread. After all, anything that people desperately want is automatically great. Such as heroin.

So all those who said that we couldn't flood the market with easy access gamps can eat their hats. Of course, what state these brollies will be in when returned to us, assuming we get them back at all, is another matter. But we won't worry about that for now. We can always send the boys round later if anyone defaults. Or bang them up in the brolly debtor prisons we will soon be running.

Busy day for me today. In a minute I have to face the Gareth Chilcott inquiry to brazenly lie and defend claims I made about Umbrellas of Mass Destruction (UMD) in Iraq. Then it is on a train ooop North for the first leg of my Big Arse tour. It's only Bogg'n'Roll but I like it.

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