UK Budget Vs. Susan Boyle

Wednesday's British budget has been signposted as the most important budget for a generation and will probably see UK Chancellor Alistair Darling coming clean about the state of public finances.

Geoff Cutmore
CNBC Anchor

The Chancellor will probably acknowledge that his confident call just 5 months ago of a modest 0.75 percent to 1.25 percent contraction in GDP was somewhat wide of the mark. The Bank of England’s own estimates range between 3 percent and 4 percent..

The Chancellor has little room to increase public spending -- and most taxpayers are wondering where the burden of meeting the deficit is likely to fall. It is then an important UK budget this week.

Given its importance people should be hanging off the Chancellors every word. Surely an exclusive YoutTube presentation could be expected to draw in the crowds of interested taxpayers and voters seeking clues about their financial future!

• Slideshow: The Budget in Pictures

That's not quite what happened.

So far the Chancellor’s upbeat appearance on Youtube described as ‘Alistair Darling prepares for the budget’ has garnered 3,292 views as of 9.44 am London Time, Wednesday morning.

Susan Boyle More Popular than the Chancellor.

By contrast the leading video of "Britains Got Talent" phenomenon Susan Boyle has wracked up over 30 million views. Even the video titled "Cute Doggy" managed 224,000 more hits than the Chancellor.

It's probably specious to try and do the comparison, but lets persevere. Admittedly the video of the West Lothian singer has been on the YouTube site a week longer. And Darling, to my knowledge, hasn’t been invited to appear on the "Oprah Winfrey Show" -- thereby missing out on that publicity.

But, early analysis of the raw data would suggest less interest in the Chancellors view of the prospects for UK economic recovery than the prospects for the Elaine Paige wannabee.

As we know the decisions the Chancellor makes will affect us, our parents and our children's standard of living and quality of life for years to come. Where as the performance of the Scottish vocalist may bring a smile, but won’t determine whether you can put 3 square meals a day on the table for your family.

I would welcome suggestions as to why this disparity? Surely not sound-bite fatigue, or perhaps a cynical disregard for the views of our current crop of leaders!

-- feedback welcome

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