Causes of the European debt crisis historian Robert Skidelsky added that it was indeed excessive lending by banks, not deficit spending that created this crisis. Government's mounting debts are a response to the economic downturn as spending rises and tax revenues fall, not its cause. Either way, high debt levels alone may not explain the crisis. According to The Economist Intelligence Unit, the position of the euro area looked "no worse and in some respects, rather better than that of the US or the UK." The budget deficit for the euro area as a whole (see graph) is much lower and the euro area's government debt/GDP
Notional election results local government wards, and it is the results from local government elections that are the primary source used to calculate notional results at a constituency level. Professors Colin Rallings and Michael Thrasher of Plymouth University have been involved in calculating notional results for general elections since 1992 where periodic boundary changes have taken place. The data compiled from their work has been used by several prominent media companies including television channels for the purposes of comparing one general election result to the last. Notional results have their limitations in that voting patterns may well have been different had new boundaries