The Pre Budget (p)Ropaganda

Any normal person would expect and hope that something as serious as the chancellor's autumn statement would be clear and open. It seems that we are wrong.

Its purpose is not to inform but to obscure, not to deal with the economic problems but to secure political advantage.

The statement will not take place until 3.30, and the press will not be given a copy until about 4.30. They then have to digest something which is deliberately constructed to be obscure and misleading in time for the press deadlines. This is very difficult - see the excellent posting by Fraser Nelson on the Coffee House Blog today. The same difficulty confronts the opposition.

This is built upon by two further ruses by the Government:

1) To relegate very important items and qualifications to hidden footnotes, to delay the discovery of the mendacity. The devil really is in the detail.

2) (Increasingly) to leak false trails, red herrings and the points which will receive prominence anyway, in the hope of deceiving press and opposition alike.

Of course, as in the case of the 10p debacle in 2007, Brown received momentary acclaim which was reduced within 24 hours when all the small print had been studied, but he had gained , until it all blew up in his face after a few weeks, when MPs and others realised that they had been conned.

So this evening, while press and opposition have time to concentrate on only the items which have been leaked in advance or fully displayed during the presentation in parliament, expect Brown to tour the TV studios basking in glory. The fact that the the full implications may take a few days to emerge, the deceit to be unravelled, and the idol shown to have feet of clay, does not matter so much. Brown will have gained a political advantage and bolstered his image as the world's saviour, and these may take some time to be reduced.

It's a sad reflection that a statement which is so serious for the nation's economic well being should become instead an attempt to gain narrow political advantage. It is all the more galling, because it is practiced by someone who is so quick to condemn his opponents on the shakiest grounds of doing the same.

Democracy in general and politicians in particular deserve something better.