UK finance minister tops British nightmares: survey

Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne, delivers his keynote speech at the Conservative Party's annual conference, in Birmingham, central England October 8, 2012.

LONDON (Reuters) - Finance minister George Osborne is the public figure that most often appears in British nightmares, a recent study has found.

Ruling Conservative party member Osborne, whose official title is Chancellor of the Exchequer, was booed during a medal ceremony at the Paralympics this summer in London and has been the focus of public criticism for austerity measures which have seen cuts to welfare budgets and a freeze in public sector pay.

Gordon Brown, the former Labour prime minister, came second in the survey conducted by hotel group Travelodge, which asked 2,000 people about their nightmares.

The former glamour model Katie Price, also known as Jordan, beat a number of other politicians to come third.

"Suffering from nightmares that involve the Chancellor, money and losing a job are a true reflection of how the credit crunch, and the double dip recession, has affected our well-being as well as our money", Shakila Ahmed, a spokeswoman for Travelodge, said.

(Reporting by Stephen Eisenhammer, editing by Paul Casciato)