Where are Britain's unexploded sub-prime bombs?
Fraser Nelson 5:03pm
Of all the scary economic forecasts we've heard recently, perhaps the most chilling is the idea that we're nine months behind America on the credit crunch. What would it mean for us? And what political effect might it have?
In tomorrow's magazine, George Bridges, former campaigns director for Cameron, does for us what politicians do for themselves at election time. He has asked Experian, the credit rating agency, to trawl its vast database and list sub-prime penetration by constituency. Of the 200 worst affected seats, all but 14 are held by Labour. It is, as George puts it, "a punch in the financial solar plexus for those Brown has purported to champion."
We're doing a first on Coffee House today, two pdf files (the first is here , and the second here ) showing some of the research used to produce the cover. This is not a list of actual debtors, no such list exists. But Experian's business is identifying over-extended debtors and details how many households are in its sub-prime risk category. If you want to know where the unexploded sub-prime bombs are planted in Britain, this is the list you need. Given that Brown's debt years have left us at the mercy of the credit crunch, he can do little more than hope they don't detonate.
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Comments
Jennie
April 2nd, 2008 6:49pmIs the first list just households in a constituency with mortgage arrears, or all households in a constituency with low credit ratings?
Mark P
April 2nd, 2008 8:14pmThis is just devastating for Brown. I work in the mortgage industry and have never seen this type of figures before even in the FT - didnt expect to find them in a website of a magazine! if we have places 75% exposed to subprime, then you can bet it will be a matter of time before the scenes we're seeing in America come to Britain.
Conservative Homer
April 2nd, 2008 8:21pmSays something about the intelligence of the average labour voter. Firstly they vote labour, and secondly their financial planning is sub-prime too!
Mike
April 2nd, 2008 11:00pmIt's not desperately surprising that the highest ratio of sub-prime borrowers (i.e. those with a credit score of less than 620) are situated in poorer locations which are 99% Labour seats. But it shows how politically damaging this is for Labour
Fergus Pickering
April 3rd, 2008 4:15amIf you are poor then voting Labour used to be a good bet though perhaps it isn't now, which accounts for, say, Frank Field, feeling that the poor have been especially betrayed by this government. inancial planning is what you do when you are rich, or richish. When you are poor you just hang on by your fingernails. Which is why the behaviour of lenders is particularly reprehensible. But then whoever believed a banker or a financial advisor. Bottom-feeders the Americans call them, which sounds properly disgusting.
Mike
April 3rd, 2008 9:17amSurely it is a statement of the blindingly obvious that the least wealthy are the most vulnerable to the sub prime fall out and they tend to be concentrated most in labour seats. To suggest, as some correspondents have, that it is is a measure of Labour voter's lack of intelligence is puerile.
Thomas Widmann
April 3rd, 2008 10:03amI'm wondering why the ratio of sub-prime borrowers is so high in the west of Scotland, and parts of northern England, but very low in London and the south-east. Sure, people earn less in the former, but the cost of living is lower; in particular, houses are much cheaper.
It makes me wonder whether credit scoring is based too much on absolute figures, e.g., house prices, and less on whether people are able to live within their means.
TrevorH
April 3rd, 2008 10:03pmWhy SHOULD the poor automatically vote Labour?
You would think the penny would have droppped by now. Labour are KEEPING them poor.
Tory slogans should be 'ambition' 'opportunity', to go along with 'compassion'.
Jennie
April 4th, 2008 11:44amAnd the Tories would keep the poor even poorer.
Fergus Pickering
April 5th, 2008 12:02pmLabour keep the poor poor so that they will go on voting for them. Tories make them richer so that they will become Tories. Of course Tories have to spend time clearing up the mess Labour made. And this time they've had TWELVE YEARS to make a really big mess.
Jennie
April 5th, 2008 3:51pmSo did Labour vote out the Major government because the Tories had made them richer? And people still remember the recession of the early 90s, redundancies, reposessions and banruptcies.