Comments on: No to Bradford and Bingley nationalisation

By: henry

henry — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 08:40:00 +0000

Permettez-moi de comprendre cela, je tiens à vous remercier. Je vais toujours revenir ici

By: Eddie Allen

Eddie Allen — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 16:07:26 +0000

Considering B&B primarily deal with the Buy to Let investors which are strictly in a mess as a result of their own actions.
And Buy to Let repossession rates have TRIPLED in the last 12 months, and ALL deposits are backed by guarantee to £35,000, and ALL residential mortgage holders have NOT ONE THING TO WORRY ABOUT regardless who owns their DEBT.
Then I think Gordon Blown is either seeking to sucker the nation, or he doesn't know what he's talking about.

When it comes to taxpayers and nationalization as the only option he can see, I think its way past time he left.
By imposing this unncessary burden on the taxpayers, he is making them take on the risk of keeping this outfit open simply to avoid branch closures. The branches are no doubt full of people, convinced that Labour will save them yet he's done an 18 month deal on that which happens just to be the time he has left in office on the outside.

Meanwhilew, many Americans are back to living in wigwams again and despite thousands of ordinary folk have been repossessed from their homes, the US and the UK want them to pay for the recovery packages of the very people who made them homeless !!! Staggeringly unbelievable but there it is !!!

So how have others handled this downward spiral in finance ?
Russian premier Vladimir Putin has engaged VEB.
A business loan DIRECT to the business ( not to the bank ), and thereby securing the interests of workers and taxpayers, and its industries which otherwise banks and bailout boys would be picking off by forcing foreclosures on business loans which would otherwise land a certain amount of prizes for foreign bankers when the market returns.

Who's looking after the interests of workers, jobs, assets, business and the economy better. Is it Putin or Brown ?

By: mikestallard

mikestallard — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 08:00:19 +0000

There is one thing you ought to add to all this.
Why did they suddenly start lending lots of money to people whom they knew would never repay them?
The big question is this: how much did fashionable ideas about racism, the vulnerable, the hardworking poor etc etc colour their decision both here and in USA?
This has not been answered yet.
Maybe it is time to examine our own shibboleths?

By: Donald Mills

Donald Mills — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 20:40:11 +0000

It was once stated that the duty of directors was to the Shareholders. This no longer seems to be the case. It seems increasingly that the duty of the directors is to themselves and themselves alone. In saying the shareholders are to blame for investing in banks that then go bust, it is surely the duty of the directors in such unheard of cases to throw themselves on their swords and not give themselves and their friends fat bonuses before retiring to sunnier climes.
This is a disgraceful situation bought on by greed, greed and yet more greed. To say Gordon Brown is responsible for the collapse of the banking industry because he borrowed excess money is as absurd as it is devious. It was not Brown borrowing money that caused this problem it was an unholy alliance of Solicitors, Estate agents and banks selling worthless property to people who the agents knew could never afford the repayments that bought on this situation. They even had the nerve to rewrite the work JUNK as Sub-Prime. B&B was one such typical example and full of junk. The shareholders however were not to know this. Check out the B&B flow chart for dealings.. Even Alexander would never have unpicked that unholy knot.

If one also wanted to call those people who took out such mortgages idiots or irresponsible then the system was once designed to be almost idiot proof. However, the bankers greed has overridden the idiot proofing system, and bankers prudence vanished on the altar of greed and we are all now just beginning to reap the results.

By: Mark

Mark — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 17:04:57 +0000

Businesses that make bad choices (and unfortunately the people that invest in those businesses) must suffer the consequences of their bad choices. I am not a shareholder in B&B and I can see no reason at all why my looted tax money should prop them up. No more socialist nonsense please! Pretty please!

By: Donald Mills

Donald Mills — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 16:40:40 +0000

So poor Mr and Mrs save for it a rainy day have now lost what little they have and it follows the biblical adage about those who have little, that also will be taken away.
So this seems to be a truth against which the masses cannot protect themselves. Well.I`m one of them and I can tell you it hurts like hell.!
If the Conservative party had one ounce of decency which it seems they do not, they would be calling for those who have created this financial mess to foot the bill.
Instead of which, silence ! , Blame Brown, Blame the Labour party, blame the workers, blame the savers but never, ever, blame the financiers.
Maybe Australia and now Austria going right wing has the right idea, who knows?

By: TimP

TimP — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 13:31:42 +0000

Thanks once again Mr Redwood for helping to expose the lies and deceits of this obnoxious administration.

In reply to "david" 28 Sept 4:31pm, this has nothing to do with demutualisation per se. Ceasing to be a mutual did not give the management of B&B carte blanche to pursue a fundamentally flawed business model.

It is very difficult to avoid "Mike Gill's" conclusion above that the dying days of the Brown administration is solely concerned with a scorched earth policy designed primarily to buy Brown a day or two of survival at a time, while ensuring that the incoming administration will have both hands tied behind its back for years to come (sorry about the mixed meaphors!). It does, sadly, seem that this approach can be effective in the UK: just look at how many people still bleat about the "damage" caused by the Conservative administration in purging this country of the socialist mess of the 1970's!

This creeping "nationalisation" is fully in accord with the present administration's "command and control" approach to every aspect of our lives.

By: Stephen Southworth

Stephen Southworth — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 12:40:12 +0000

David, I think you'll find that the de-mutualisation policy was supported by Mr Gordon Brown when in opposition.

By: K Walsh

K Walsh — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 12:25:53 +0000

The inference is that any savings people had with B & B have been saved. Not if those savings are in the form of shares!

By: Manfarang

Manfarang — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 10:09:25 +0000

Not a lot of good security in the wonky banks!