Sunday: German chancellor Angela Merkel says "we want to tell savers that their money is safe - the government guarantees that".

Did she really mean it? The BBC has been investigating, and, apparently, she did not. It was just a political statement...

The government has been seeking to clarify her remarks amid concerns that Britain would have to follow suit to stop savings ebbing away from British banks.

But the BBC understands she was making a political commitment that savers would not lose money, rather than guaranteeing unlimited 100% protection.

The prime minister's spokesman said: "Our understanding of the situation is that the German government will not be bringing forward legislation for a legally-binding guarantee of bank deposits."

Presumably the full sentence would have been something like "we want to tell savers that their money is safe - the government guarantees that - but we can't because it isn't actually true."