The aforementioned “No More Boom And Bust” quotes that were linked to by an anonymous commenter on Iain Dale’s Diary, incidentally, have indeed disappeared from HM Treasury’s website, as Guido pointed out in his curiously absent post on the matter.
However, a little digging around reveals more details, as always. The pages haven’t actually disappeared from the site, but their links have all changed. below is a list of the quotes, with links to the actual pages that contain them
- Pre-Budget Report, 9th November 1999 – “Under this Government, Britain will not return to the boom and bust of the past.”
- Budget Statement, 21 March 2000 – “Britain does not want a return to boom and bust.”
- Pre-Budget Report, 8 November 2000 – “So our approach is to reject the old vicious circle of the…the old boom and bust.”
- Budget Statement, 7 March 2001 – “Mr Deputy Speaker we will not return to boom and bust.”
- Budget Statement, 22 March 2006 – “As I have said before Mr Deputy Speaker: No return to boom and bust.”
- Budget Statement, 21 March 2007 – “And we will never return to the old boom and bust.”
When webpages start turning into IP addresses, one has to wonder what the world is coming to. Do HM Treasury not know that we can still find information they try and hide? It’s called ‘search’, guys. What did you think we would use it for?!