Are we talking ourselves into a recession?

However, coming in the middle of higher food prices, interest rates and fuel costs, the inevitable outcry was followed by the equally inevitable groveling apology, and the minister will no doubt welcome the opportunity of disappearing back into the obscurity of his transport brief, with a flea in his ear from the luckless Gordon Brown.
But, could Harris actually have a point? Are we demonstrating a typical 'the glass is half empty' British attitude that makes an economic recession a self fulfilling prophecy?
Watching a re-run of Andrew Marr's excellent documentary series 'A History of Modern Britain', I was reminded of what a real recession feels like. Interest rates of 15 per cent! Three million unemployed (and they were only the official figures). Our inner cities were in crisis, and communities that had been built on traditional industries like manufacturing and coal were being abandoned and devastated.
There was, we were told, no such thing as society. Does today's Britain feel anything like that? It doesn't to me.
The current economic concerns began with a slow down in the housing market. But, given the massive increases we have witnessed in property prices for almost a decade, a correction in the market was bound to happen. Did anyone think that year on year rises in house values of up to 25% were sustainable?
Inflation is creeping up, but is still in low digits; unemployment is well below what we have suffered in the past; and interest rates are only in danger of increasing because 'stagflated' Brits continue to shop-till-they-drop. The month of May saw record sales achieved in the retail sector.
With an imminent change to the American presidency and the U.S. not suffering as deep a downturn as many experts expected; a promise from oil barons to increase supply; and a £50 billion injection of cash into our banking system by the Government, we still have good reasons to believe that a full blown recession can be avoided.
But, if the doom and gloom merchants continue to dominate the television news programmes and the rest of the media, we may suffer despite the positive indications to the contrary. Maybe Harris had a point after all. We should stop bloody moaning.