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Biografía De James Gordon Brown (En Inglés)

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Biografía De James Gordon Brown (En Inglés) Biografía de James Gordon Brown (en Inglés) Dr. James Gordon Brown (born 20 February 1951) is the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the United Kingdom and a British Labour Party politician. From 1983 to 2005 he was the Member of Parliament for the constituency of Dunfermline East and following a reorganisation of parliamentary constituencies in Scotland he is now MP for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath. Brown has headed HM Treasury since May 1997, making him the longest continuously serving Chancellor since Nicholas Vansittart (1812-1823). He is regarded as the second most powerful member of the present British government and is expected to assume the leadership of the Labour Party, and so become Prime Minister, before the end of 2007. Early Parliamentary career. He was elected to Parliament as a Labour MP for Dunfermline East in 1983, becoming opposition spokesman on Trade and Industry in 1985, then Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury and Shadow Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, before becoming Shadow Chancellor in 1992. After the sudden death of John Smith, Brown was one of those tipped as a potential party leader. It has long been rumoured that a deal was struck between the two men at the Granita restaurant in Islington, that Blair promised to give Brown complete control of economic policy in return for Brown not standing against him in the leadership election. Whether this is true or not, the relationship between Blair and Brown has been central to the fortunes of "New Labour", and they have mostly remained united in public despite reported rifts. As Shadow Chancellor, Brown worked hard to present himself as a fiscally competent Chancellor-in-waiting, to reassure business and the middle class that Labour could be trusted to run the economy without fuelling inflation, increasing unemployment or spending too much. He committed Labour to following the Conservatives' spending plans for the first two years after taking power. Once this two-year period was over, his 2000 Spending Review outlined a major expansion of government spending (particularly on health and education). Chancellor of the Exchequer Many British political commentators have stated[citation needed] that Gordon Brown was appointed Chancellor as the result of a power brokerage agreement with Tony Blair. On taking office as Chancellor, Brown surprised many by giving the Bank of England operational independence in the conduct of monetary policy, and thus responsibility for setting interest rates -- a policy devised by Ed Balls, his long-time chief economic adviser and now an MP and the Economic Secretary to the Treasury. The Conservatives opposed this reform as a prelude to entering the Euro (until Michael Portillo became Shadow Chancellor in 1999), whilst Bank of England independence had been a key plank of Liberal Democrat economic policy since the 1992 general election. Brown has adhered to Labour's election pledge not to increase the basic or higher rates of income tax: he reduced the starting rate from 20% to 10% in 1999 and the basic rate from 23% to 22% in 2000. However, he has failed to increase the tax boundaries at the same rate as inflation, leading to a process of fiscal drag in which more taxpayers are drawn into the upper rates (e.g. in 2000-01 there were 2,880,000 higher-rate taxpayers, whereas in 2005-06 there were 3,160,000). Corporation tax has fallen under Brown, from a main rate of 33% to 30%, and from 24% to 19% for small businesses. In his April 2002 budget, he raised national insurance to pay for health spending; this is a tax on income separate from personal income tax. Brown has changed tax policy in other ways, including through the working tax credits. This is one of several ideas borrowed from the US Clinton adminstration whereby welfare payments are accounted for as negative taxation. The separate means-testing process for tax credits has been criticised by some as bureaucratic, and in 2003-04 and 2004-05 problems in the system led to overpayments of £2.2bn and £1.8bn respectively. However, economic theory suggests that tax credits can strengthen work incentives for those at the margin between employment and unemployment, and the IFS has estimated that the reforms brought at least 50,000 single mothers into work (and hence contributed to fighting child poverty). UK taxation has increased from 39.3% of GDP in 1997 to 42.4% in 2006, according to the OECD, moving to a higher rate than Germany. This increase has mainly been attributed to active changes in government policy rather than passive changes resulting from a growing economy in an existing tax system. To have brought this about with only one explicit tax rise has led to accusations from critics, particularly the Conservatives, of Brown imposing stealth taxes. Brown has pointed to two main accomplishments: growth and employment. An OECD report shows UK economic growth has averaged 2.7% between 1997 and 2006, higher than the Eurozone's 2.1% though lower than any other English-speaking country. UK unemployment is 5.5%, down from 7% in 1997 and lower than the Eurozone's average of 8.1%. Between 1999 and 2002 Brown sold 60% of the UK's gold reserves at $275 an ounce. It was later attacked as a "disastrous foray into international asset management" as he had sold at close to a 20-year low. Prices went on to reach $700 an ounce in May 2006 - he could have raised £4bn for the public had he waited. He pressured the IMF to do the same, but it resisted. In October 1997, he took control of the United Kingdom's membership of the European single currency issue by announcing the Treasury would set five economic tests to ascertain whether the economic case had been made. In June 2003 the Treasury indicated that the tests had not been met. Brown's lengthy period as Chancellor of the Exchequer has set several records. He is the longest-serving Labour Chancellor of the Exchequer (ahead of Denis Healey, who was Chancellor for 5 years and 2 months from 5 March 1974 to 4 May 1979). On 15 June 2004, he became the longest continuous serving Chancellor of the Exchequer since the Reform Act 1832, passing the figure of 7 years and 43 days set by David Lloyd George (1908–1915). However, William Gladstone was Chancellor for a total of 12 years and 4 months in the period from 1852 to 1882 (although not continuously). As he is quick to point out, his Chancellorship has seen the longest period of sustained economic growth in UK history, although in truth this growth period started under the preceding Conservative government in 1993 after the United Kingdom's exit from the Exchange Rate Mechanism. In October 2004 Tony Blair announced he would not lead the party into a fourth general election, but would serve out a full third term. Brown has for some time promoted the cause of acting to reduce Third World debt and following the Asian Tsunami Disaster this has positioned Brown well inside the curve of popular opinion in the UK. Political controversy over the relationship between Brown and Blair in advance of the UK general election, 2005 continued up to that election, where Blair won a reduced majority, a reduced vote share for the Labour Party, and then confirmed that he would not fight the next general election. Ahead of the 2005 general election, the two campaigned together seeking to bury their disagreement. But the British media remains full of reports about the acrimony between the two. .
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