Sir Keir announced Gordon Brown as his Special Reviewer on Global Finance and Cooperation, earlier this month, and the sense among MPs was one of bafflement.<\/p>\n
Former Conservative minister, Lord Redwood, told GB News: \u201cGordon will be a very useful investment adviser as long as Keir remembers to do the opposite. Infallibly wrong.\u201d<\/p>\n
An anonymous Labour MP told the BBC: \u201cIt’s a joke. There is no question to which bringing these two back is the answer.\u201d<\/p>\n
The new report details how, in May 1999, the price of gold was $282.40 per oz, the lowest it had been in 20 years. At the request of Mr Brown, the Treasury announced its intentions to sell part of the UK\u2019s gold reserves at the bottom of the market.<\/p>\n
FACTS4EU worked out on May 15, this year, the same amount of gold would have been sold for \u00a343.5billion.<\/p>\n
The report also finds Mr Brown played a substantial role in a crisis that cost the taxpayer \u00a345.5billion. <\/p>\n
![\"FACTS4EU\"\/](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/facts4eu.png\")
Gordon Brown sold UK gold reserves at the bottom of the market, costing the UK billions <\/p>\n
| <\/p>\n
GB NEWS<\/p>\n
After becoming a banker, the former Prime Minister had been a backer of the massive expansion of the Royal Bank of Scotland.<\/p>\n
RBS had made a huge EU acquisition of ABN Amro, which greatly overstretched its management and balance sheet, leading to its collapse.<\/p>\n
Mr Brown had supported the takeover, which saw a mega-bank with its headquarters in Scotland.<\/p>\n
Upon its collapse, the taxpayer, via the UK Government and HM Treasury, became the majority shareholder of RBS in November 2008, taking a 58 per cent stake. <\/p>\n
![\"FACTS4EU\"\/](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1779326292_322_facts4eu.png\")
Overall the Royal Bank of Scotland collapse cost the taxpayer \u00a310.5billion<\/p>\n
| <\/p>\n
GB NEWS<\/p>\n
By December 2009, the country\u2019s total ownership of RBS rose to 84.4 per cent, costing the taxpayer \u00a345.5billion.<\/p>\n
Lord Redwood continued: \u201cGordon Brown cost this country dear. Selling gold too cheaply to buy Euros and dollars to help the young European currency lost us billions of future gains.<\/p>\n
\u201cBacking RBS in a disastrous EU takeover which helped crash the bank saw him pay too much for shares to prop it up.<\/p>\n
\u201cPredictable large losses followed when later governments sold the shares.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mr Brown\u2019s third most expensive period on the UK taxpayer was an advocate for the EU\u2019s Exchange Rate Mechanism.<\/p>\n
Created in 1979, the UK would join in 1990 but obtained an opt-out from joining EMU in return for agreeing to the next major Treaty amendment, the Maastricht Treaty, in 1991.<\/p>\n
While not Chancellor at the time the UK joined, Mr Brown acted as a cheerleader for joining, setting the scene for \u201cBlack Wednesday\u201d.<\/p>\n
This is confirmed on the Government website, which reads: \u201cAfter a flood of selling the pound on foreign stock exchanges, Britain was forced to leave the ERM in 1992, less than two years after joining. <\/p>\n
![\"FACTS4EU\"\/](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1779326292_837_facts4eu.png\")
Gordon Brown’s endorsements have cost the UK over \u00a355billion<\/p>\n
| <\/p>\n
GB NEWS <\/p>\n
\u201cThis day became known as \u2018Black Wednesday’, costing the UK Treasury \u00a33.3billion.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lord Redwood concluded: \u201cFar from saving the world, Gordon Brown backed policies which allowed and even encouraged banks to over-reach and then helped crash them with measures to curb the inflation caused.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was a strong proponent of the UK joining the ruinous European Exchange Rate mechanism, which brought us inflation, big losses and recession.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhilst he was right to delay the UK’s entry into the Euro, he did not rule out membership.<\/p>\n
\u201cHis backing for buying Euros, expanding RBS more in Europe, and especially for the European Exchange Rate Mechanism disaster, imposed many EU losses on the UK.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sir Keir Starmer is set for a fresh crisis as a new report reveals how much damage his…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":595336,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[84,1294,33142,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-595335","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-business","tag-economy","tag-membership","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/595335","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=595335"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/595335\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/595336"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=595335"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=595335"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=595335"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}