The contradictions of Fraser Nelson

Fraser Nelson is upset with this passage, from my blog about statistics yesterday:

A similar, but even more toxic, disjunction from reality is seen in those who claim that poverty is not about money. For example, Fraser Nelson frequently claims that the Labour government saw poverty solely through the lens of numbers, and that the Brown strategy of attacking child poverty by redistributing money to the poor via tax credits was simply manipulating numbers on a spreadsheet. 

Fraser says:

You quote me saying “poverty is not about money”. I’ve never said that. My point: it’s not JUST about money. Please correct.

Fraser can read and isn’t stupid, so he knows perfectly well I didn’t “quote” him directly saying “poverty is not about money”; rather, I attributed that view to him (among others). And I linked to his Telegraph article, in which he says this:

At the heart of the Child Poverty Act lies an agenda which has arguably done more damage to Britain’s social fabric than any idea in modern history. It is based on the Eurostat definition of poverty: an income 40 per cent below the national average....instead of fighting poverty, the Labour government spent billions manipulating a spreadsheet – to catastrophic effect.

Tax credits boosted the incomes of low income families and reduced poverty as measured by low income.  It is therefore, as a matter of simple logic, impossible for Fraser to admit that, as he did yesterday, that “low income is the most important measure of poverty”, and at the same time stand by his earlier view that billions were spent on tax credits “instead of fighting poverty”. 

    

If Fraser’s point was that at least some of the money spent on tax credits could have been spent more efficiently on addressing poverty in other ways – that is, that what Labour did was not necessarily the best way of fighting poverty - then he could have said that. But he didn’t. Instead, he claimed that money spent on tax credits made absolutely no difference to poverty – and indeed, in some undefined sense, had a “catastrophic” impact.  And just in case anyone thinks I’m quoting him selectively, nowhere in his entire article is there anything remotely consistent with his admission yesterday that low income is indeed the most important measure of poverty..

Now it may be that the obvious contradiction between Fraser’s article and what he said yesterday means he’s changed his mind. In that case he should say so. Or maybe he never really meant what he wrote, but went over the top in his hyperbole, Again, he should say so. What he shouldn’t do is try to pretend he never made an argument he – rightly – describes as “repugnant”. 

Finally, Fraser decided to invoke the Independent Press Standards Organisation, resulting in this exchange:

He has declined to take me up on it. The offer remains open.