Duly credited

Credit where credit's due to BBC business reporter/presenter Andy Verity for this (which I transcribed from Wednesday's BBC One News at One (no longer on the iPlayer), following the release of the latest employment/unemployment figures:

You might think this rise in unemployment is significant, especially as it's the first time the figures have covered a period which is mostly after the referendum. But it's a rise of 10,000. That's not huge. It's within the margin of error. It could be wrong. 

And it's nothing like the official predictions of a rise in unemployment that were made before the referendum. 

Predictions made my HM Treasury - endorsed by distinguished economists as reasonable - said that after a vote to leave there'd be an immediate shock to the economy, pushing unemployment up by 500,000 over two years or, worse, a severe shock that would put it up by 800,000, and the economy would fall into a recession with four quarters of negative growth. 

Those predictions now look way out.

And though he followed that by saying that some companies are struggling in this post-Brexit vote period, the business he actually included in his report was doing well, buoyed by the cheap pound.

And though he then included an economist (of the Remain persuasion I guessed) saying that it's early days and things could still go wrong, that still struck me as being a decent, fair report from the BBC.

It can be done.