Sales at established stores in Japan rose by 50% from a low base.
It is true that the country's credit-card market is growing (local banks had issued nearly 270m cards by the end of the third quarter last year, up by 20% on a year earlier) but from a low base.
Osborne, by contrast, started from a low base especially amoing non-Tories.
Over the past five years, as the number of youngsters entering alcohol rehab dropped by a quarter, the number of female pensioners starting treatment for alcoholism increased by 65% (although from a low base of 1,436).
But that was a period in which the starting yield was high and yields have since fallen, giving a further boost to returns in the form of a capital gain (a market that starts with a dividend yield of 5% and ends with one of 2.5% doubles in price, other things being equal).In the current market climate, the dividend yield is low by historic standards, creating a low base for returns.
"We had a strong start to 2008, with record sales," says David Smith, JLR's chief executive, "2007 was Land Rover's third record year, we made £327m profit, and more in the first half of 2008, so we were very profitable".Since then, however, sales have fallen 22% by volume despite a strong performance (albeit from a low base) by Jaguar, thanks to the success of its new XF saloon.
Growth was strongest in India, rising by 47% a year from a low base, but the fee pool in China and its region was almost the size of Japan's, which has a much larger domestic market (see chart 9).
It was the highest increase in 14 months, influenced by rising domestic oil prices and a low base period, but was still within market expectations.
Overall, the ethnic-minority population outside London has increased by 90%, against a more modest rise of 63% in the capital.In Kent, an affluent county south of London, the size of the ethnic-minority population has grown by 115% since 2001, albeit from a low base.
