Gordon Brown, Britain’s prime minister, this week called in his senior ministers and delivered a bold boast: after less than three months in office, his administration had proved it could “govern well” in tumultuous times.

In a week that saw the first big run on a British bank since the 1860s and new outbreaks of bovine foot-and-mouth disease – following biosecurity breaches at a state-funded laboratory – the claim displayed iron self-belief.