Just imagine: You are Gordon Brown. You have spent £167 million on advertising, £29 million on PR and sponsorship and £12 million on “strategic consultancy”, totalling nearly £400m on spin in the past year.

What would you expect to be getting for it?

A positive personal rating? A poll boost? A donations rise?

Instead you get terrible poll results, called an electoral liability by a senior member of your own party, and have 76% of the electorate thiking that your government is being run badly.

Wouldn’t you think that you had got more than slightly fleeced? And you’d be right.

At times like this, I almost feel sorry for Gorden Brown. But then I remember that it’s our money he’s throwing away on spin.