Clanger ridden Maude strikes again

Not for the first time in his life, Tory Party Chairman Francis Maude appears to have dropped a clanger. US economist Irwin Selzer once said of Maude...: "I do hope that the remaining members [of the Tories' council of economic advisers] will help you to improve the forecasting skills that led you to predict a recession immediately before the nation's rate of economic growth soared and unemployment began to fall." Well, now it is being reported that...

The investment trust that has cost Tory party chairman Francis Maude dearly in terms of publicity may have also put him seriously out of pocket. Jubilee Investment Trust - which catapulted Maude, a director, into the tabloids after it was revealed it had invested in a porn star's DVD empire - is now set to wind up following almost four years of marked underperformance that has see it lose three quarters of its original capital.

And this is the man that Wee Wullie Hague appointed to be Shadow chancellor and shadow economic affairs secretary. I bet Gordon used to shake in his boots every time he came up against this incometent across the despatch box.