What a pity that there has been so little publicity and therefore outrage at this Governments introduction of a new child profiling tool called ONSET, which will profile our children to determine whether they are likely to become a young offender. This Government has spent an inordinate amount of time, effort and legislative time to ensure that people are not discriminated against based on their gender, sexuality, race or religion and yet, they seek to justify a profiling system that will identify potential child offenders based on their background.

What, you may ask, will they do with this information when they have it? Will they ‘tag’ potential offenders, monitor their movements, track their mobile phone calls, internet habits, email etc? Will they blacklist these ‘potential offenders’ from working in the public sector, or certain jobs, or will they issue a presumptuous ASBO? Does anyone truly believe that State authorities will not use this information for some discriminatory purpose? When did our right to be innocent until proven guilty disappear, perhaps it was with the introduction of the new detention without trial laws? I don’t know, but there is something seriously wrong with society and people in general if they are prepared to allow the State so much power, that they can do whatever they want. Our reluctance to do or say anything is a betrayal of future generations, because one thing is absolutely certain, no government will ever give up these new powers willingly.

What have our local members of parliament been doing when legislation of this type is introduced, perhaps there is a clue in the fact that unless it is Prime Ministers Questions, parliament is virtually empty. Little wonder that contempt for MP’s has turned into outright hatred as they spend more and more time looking at how they can screw their expenses to maximise their earnings, rather than doing what they are paid for. As for the opposition parties, what have they been doing whilst all this has been going on? Their job is to hold the government to account, they too have failed the people of this country.

Keeping a roof over our heads, food on the table and earning a living are logical and understandable priorities, but to ignore other massive issues such as our fundamental right to freedom, liberty and a right to live our lives without an overbearing state is simply parlous. If we cannot enjoy our freedom and liberty, what is the point in it all? Like it or not, the state is pimping off the people, demanding ever more money. The bottom line is, that the State Pimp lives off the backs of honest hardworking citizens, but the State Pimp also knows, that at some stage, the people will rise and ask why Government needs to take over 50% of our earned income in direct and indirect taxation?

To minimise state risk, they must exert more and more control over its citizens and the introduction of ONSET, DNA Databases, call and email monitoring, registration of travel information and so on is giving them precisely that. For those that think this is scaremongering, perhaps they should ask themselves why it is now, that Jacqui Smith has ordered 10,000 Tasers for all front line police officers?

ONSETis the thin end of the wedge. Though I am not advocating the LibDems as a party worthy of our vote, they are introducing the Freedom Act which is designed to roll back some 20 years of increasing state interference in our everyday lives, by repealing legislation. We should all be writing to our respective MP’s and insisting that they support this proposal.

Update: For more information http://www.jrrt.org.uk/uploads/database-state.pdf

How on earth do we stop this mad man that is Gordon Brown. Not only was he the architect of the financial system and regulation that lead us into this disastrous mess, but he is also the man that believes, he is more qualified than anyone else, to get us out of it. This deluded man is convinced that he bears no responsibility for what happened, even though everyone else knows differently. This vain man even seeks to lecture the leaders of other countries on what they must do to overcome the economic meltdown that is happening around our ears. This inept little man constantly tells the people of this country that the problems that have beset the United Kingdom are a direct result of economic and commercial mis-management in other countries, such as the United States. This incompetent man has the temerity to inform us that we are best placed to “weather the financial storm“. Yet he knows that this is not true and, that notwithstanding, no other economic expert agrees with his assessment. No doubt this could explain why it is that Gordon Brown has never told us why we are in a better position.

Gordon Brown, the unelected the prime minister of this country is a fool. He was a very poor Chancellor, arguably one of worst in our history. He has built on that well earned description by becoming one of the poorest, most incompetent prime ministers in recent times and there are plenty of former PM’s that could have been considered for that award. Any good leader would not assume that only he has all the answers and yet, Mr Brown constantly spouts on about the fact that he has the solutions and is best qualified to lead us out of this deep recession. A good leader would surround himself with knowledgeable people, not loyal soldiers, yes men and women, or business people seeking a knighthood or peerage for their ’services’. Any good leader would know that a top team would always challenge the status quo, keep them on their toes, ensure that they don’t start to believe their own publicity, question, cajole and nudge. Any good leader would not be cowed by strong people around them, but instead, seek their counsel, listen, question and heed. But, Gordon Brown has clearly demonstrated that he is NOT a good leader.

Let’s consider a few other things;

Gordon Brown, as Chancellor, was the architect of the tripartite arrangement formed between the Treasury, the FSA and the Bank of England. Yet it was the failure and inadequacies of this system which allowed interest rates to be reduced so low that a housing boom was inevitable. Each party failed to respond to the experts that had argued the housing bubble was unsustainable and there was likely to be a crash. It was the failure of this system that allowed banks to grow at a rapid rate utilising funds raised on the money markets rather than the more traditional route of saver deposits. It was the failure of this system that allowed banks to package new mortgage backed securities that were then traded, but so complicated; few people understood them or the associated risks. It was the failure of this system that permitted banks to create a culture driven by greed, short-term profits and rewarded with massive bonuses. It was this system, which was set up to control, regulate and manage the City and the economy that ultimately failed on all fronts. The architect of this tripartite arrangement was Gordon Brown and he is ultimately responsible, instead, each party points the finger at another in the triangle. Not one party has had the humility or honesty to admit any form of responsibility.

Yet Gordon Brown’s incompetence is every where, for example; In spite of experts advising him of the risks, it was Gordon Brown that raided private sector pension funds. Perhaps in the belief that private sector pensions were the preserve of the rich, rather than millions of ordinary hard-working people. In doing so, he has raised around £175bn in tax revenues. But, at what cost? Roughly two thirds of (private sector) final salary pension schemes have been closed to new members, large company pension schemes have ended up with massive deficits. Pension schemes have collapsed and, of course, those within the private sector that have not been protected by employers pumping more money in will receive much smaller pensions. Meanwhile, Gordon Brown has done nothing about the public sector final salary pension schemes, the majority of which are not funded through an annuity, but out of future tax revenues. The latest estimates put the public sector pension liabilities at a staggering £1,071bn, that is correct, BILLION. As a consequence on the government’s inaction, the ‘average’ pension enjoyed by someone in the public sector is nearly 15 times higher than that of the private sector. Another blinder from the iron chancellor that was supposed to be Gordon Brown.

Here are a few other things that Gordon Brown either presided over, or influenced as part of the government machine;

1. Introduced more stealth taxes than any other chancellor in history, equivalent to an extra 10p in the Pound on the basic rate of tax (source: Grant Thornton).
2. Solld the UK’s gold reserves at the bottom of the market ignoring expert advice not to.
3. Introduced ‘green taxes’ in the full and certain knowledge that any revenues gained were not destined to be invested in green initiatives. Yet another successful stealth tax to add to the collection. If you are starting to feel a little duped, then read on, I haven’t finished with Mr Brown yet!
4. Successfully achieved the goal of becoming prime minister without going through the inconvenience of being elected by the people. This in spite of the fact that New Labour gained their substantial commons majority with 57% of the voters supporting another party. So much for the benefits of our First Past The Post electoral system.
5. Was party to the sell out of the UK’s sovereignty to an unaccountable foreign ‘parliament’, in spite of a manifesto promise to allow the public to decide through a referendum.
6. Destroyed the union and in the process, ensured that his countrymen received more money per head than those in England and Wales.
7. Missed virtually every financial growth target announced in each successive budget without so much as a murmur from the press.
8. Successfully managed to dupe the press into believing that he was an iron chancellor driven by prudence, when in fact he was a spendthrift.
9. As the architect and driver of the revised PFI initiative originally proposed by the conservatives, saddled the country with a bill of £170bn which must be paid by 2032. Without having to include the figure as part of the public sector balance sheet.
10. Managed to keep the £780bn public pensions deficit off the books, even though this is equivalent to over £30,000 per household and must be paid out of future tax receipts. Estimates of this deficit have now been increased to over £1trillion.
11. Managed, without any consideration of the irony, to lecture people on their level of borrowings, whilst building up nearly £500bn of debt on the governments own ‘credit card’. If other recent liabilities are taken into account, this figure would rise substantially over £1trillion.
12. Introduced and supported a complicated tax credit programme that has managed to lose £2bn every year through fraud and errors.
13. Left the taxpayer saddled with £1.7bn of Metronet’s debt having been the person that pushed through the Private Public Partnership initiative for the London Underground.
14. Managed to convince the public that local authorities were responsible for the doubling of council tax. Meanwhile he was actually placing responsibility for all additional services firmly with the local councils.
15. Managed a real blinder, by camouflaging the inflation rate by changing the measurement from RPI to CPI.
16. Underwritten £17bn of debt for Network Rail, without having to include it on the public balance sheet.
17. Survived the embarrassment of claiming in March 2006 that 31,000 government employees had been trimmed off the payroll, whilst the Office for National Statistics claimed one month later, that the headcount had actually increased by 62,000 a difference of 93,000!
18. Managed to introduce such a complex set of rules and regulations, designed to extract maximum tax take that the annual Finance Act (summary of tax changes in the budget) has increased from 300 pages or so in the 1980’s to over 10,000.
19. At a time when businesses are struggling and people are having to tighten their belts, presided over a government that boasts some 78 acres of empty space in office buildings and grace and favour homes.
20. Managed to push another 3.5m people into the higher income tax bracket, using a favoured trick of ‘fiscal drag’, where the tax threshold is raised more slowly than earnings are rising, so that workers end up paying a higher proportion of their income in tax.
21. Twice shifted the timing of the ‘economic cycle’ in order that the so called “golden rule” would not be missed, resulting in a brazen massaging of the figures.
22. Ensured that there are now twice as many tax collectors as there are nurses, demonstrating firmly where the government’s priorities lie.
23. Masterfully convinced people that they are “better off under Labour” even though each family now pays more than £5,000 in extra tax, compared to 1997.

Then let’s take a look at how he has ‘fixed’ things, telling us how at least he was “doing something” as opposed to the Conservatives, who are, according to the supreme leader Mr Brown, the “do nothing party“.

He invested £billions of our money into the Royal Bank of Scotland, who are now expected to report a loss of £28bn. What level of due diligence was exercised before our money was invested into a bank with such massive liabilities? Now, we have a similar story with HBOS, here, losses have been reported at £11bn, same thing, did the government complete any due diligence prior to investing our money? I am not so worried about Lloyds TSB, they must answer to their shareholders, government and Gordon Brown must answer to the taxpayers.

Yet still more £billions of OUR money has been invested into the banking system by Gordon Brown, with the specific aim of easing lending to consumers and business as well as freeing up inter-bank lending. But this has come to nothing. Not satisfied with spending this money, yet more £billions has been pledged or spent on a bank ‘insurance scheme’ and, as is the nature of insurance, we can never truly know the extent of that commitment, other than the fact that with Gordon Brown’s track record, we know it will exceed all expectations. Over £1trillion has been spent or committed, for nothing, we have not been able to see ANY tangible benefit, in terms of what Mr Brown TOLD us we could expect.

In other words, he told us that our money was going to be used to achieve a specific objective or goal and nothing has happened. This time however, Gordon Brown has outdone himself, because nowhere in history, has a single politician spent so much money for so little, or more accurately, no return. Yet he is still there, grinning like a Cheshire cat and snarling at anyone who would dare question his actions. Anyone with an ounce of commonsense, for example, would have known that a 2.5% reduction in VAT would have little or no effect, set against a backdrop of high street retailers discounting up to 50% off the ticket price. But this arrogant little man went ahead, and as a consequence, he has wasted another £12.5bn or our money.

In the last week, much has been said about the fact that many of our most senior bankers have no relevant, professional qualifications. But ask yourself this, what qualifications has Gordon Brown got, (or did he have) that would qualify him to determine our economic future? None, zilch. He would normally be considered to have been qualified by experience, but just look above and you will see what his ‘experience’ leads to. The appointment of an inexperienced politician to the position of Chancellor of what was the 5th largest economy in the world, is akin to asking an engineering apprentice to act as Finance Director of BP.

But we are in a democracy; surely we don’t have to put up with this?

How naive we are as a people, we have been told we are in a democracy and we believed them. What type of democracy allows the coronation of a new prime minister, without any reference to the electorate? What type of democracy allows a party that received just 43% of the vote to have such a massive parliamentary majority? What type of democracy provides the PM with so much power, that he can spend or commit £1trillion without even referring the matter to a commons vote? What type of democracy allows its prime minister to continue damaging the country, its economy and its prospects without any way for the people to put a stop to it? What type of democracy allows a government to renege on a manifesto promise, without any form of recourse from the electorate?

What type of democracy allows a government to force through intrusive and overbearing legislation designed to spy on its own citizens, monitor their travel arrangements, emails, telephone calls, vehicle movements, medical records and share that information with another 780 government and private agencies? What type of democracy allows its government to shatter long held rights to privacy and liberty virtually unchallenged, to the detriment of the people? What type of democracy provides its people with no opportunity to impeach its leader if that person is considered to be acting against the interests of the majority? IT IS NOT A DEMOCRACY, it is an authoritarian dictatorship that serves the government of the time and not the people. We all need to catch a wake up, our whole parliamentary system needs a radical overhaul and members of parliament need to be reminded that they are supposed to serve the people, not themselves. If ever there was a case for the people of this country to have the power to push an eject button, this is it.

We, the people of this country need a way of bringing down a government or removing any minister that fails to act in our best interests, lies, or bullshits, not at a time that suits them, but when it suits us. Better still, we need to be ruled by people like us, not the self-serving, inward looking, expense grabbing, ego driven, twats that are currently lording it over us all. This description is not, of course, limited to the Labour Party, there are many people within other parties that simply do not give a toss about the electorate, other than once every 5 years or so when they would rely on our votes.

Despite all the political grandstanding surrounding the proposed bonuses to be paid to RBS staff, there is little that can be done about it and the government knows it. Don’t get me wrong, I am completely against the payment of bonuses to staff when the very fact that they still have a job is down entirely to the intervention of the government with taxpayers funds.

However, the fact remains that the vast majority of the staff will have some form of contractual entitlement to a bonus; the senior bankers know this and so do government ministers. For example, it is estimated that some £500m is due to be paid to ABN Amro staff and this was a pre-condition of the original sale of the business to RBS. If senior managers don’t honour their employment contracts, then they could very quickly find themselves in breech of contract and you can rest assured that there will be a massive queue of lawyers offering to take up their cases.

Gordon Brown is reported to be “very angry“, well, bully for him,  what difference will his temper tantrum make? None! Treasury minister Yvette Cooper said any contractual or legal obligations on banks to pay bonuses at a time when they were making huge losses must be “challenged“. Yeah right Yvette, you know that there is little or nothing that can be done about it, which is why you squirmed so much when John Snow put some eminently reasonable to you on Channel 4 News last night. Alistair Darling is quoted as saying “I have spoken to the chief executive of RBS, and made it quite clear, and he agrees, that no-one associated with these huge losses should be allowed to walk away with large cash bonuses.” Quite right Mr Darling, but this is a legal issue, not a place for political rhetoric.

Even David Cameron demonstrates how out of touch he is by stating “As the principal shareholder, you are able to say what is and what is not acceptable.” True Mr Cameron and that is precisely the point, but you cannot do it retrospectively, if you had any business experience you would know that, unless of course, you are simply taking us all for fools.

The truth is this government rushed into “saving the banks from collapse” and in doing so, they left any commonsense back in the office. So keen were they to be seen as the saviors of the banking world, they did not complete any form of due diligence. I know that ministers and civil servants can often be accused of rank incompetence, but this goes off the scale. No experienced businessman and I mean not one, would blindly invest into a business, however urgent the need, without completing a full review of the business. As one contributor stated on one of my recent posts on the RBS fiasco;

Due Diligence is only half of the required formula for meeting the requirements under “Standard of Care” or “Due Care”. Due care is the second half of the diligence formula and equally as important. For without it, the standard of care can not be measured.

Performing Due Diligence identifies where investment risks or exposures lie, due care is exercising the requirements discovered under due diligence to protect or mitigate exposure from those risks.

Not only has the PM missed the first but importantly government has neither the resources, skills, or initiative to deal with the second which is what ultimately leads to failures.

In the normal course of events, due diligence would have uncovered that there were, amongst other things, contractual liabilities to pay bonuses; this would have included an estimate as to the likely cost. Had the government and its advisors acted with a reasonable level of care, arguably, this whole situation would have been avoided. Government could, for example, have included conditions which required staff to sign a waiver in relation to their bonuses. Alternatively, they could have been made redundant and re-employed on new contracts, the business after all was likely to collapse. Those that were expecting large bonuses, but had been party to significant losses, could have been warned that if they attempted to exercise there ‘bonus guarantees’ they could expect to be dismissed with immediate affect and could face a claim if they had acted recklessly or without a reasonable level of care.

I am not an employment lawyer, but I am convinced that there were (’were‘ being the operative word), any number of imaginative ways in which government ministers could have avoided this massive kick in the teeth to hard pressed taxpayers if they had acted with foresight and were in receipt of legal advice. Instead, once again, the rank incompetence of government ministers has cost UK taxpayers £billions.

There have been justified cries for the bankers to pay back their bonuses and even suggestions, quite rightly in my opinion, that traders should be sued for bonuses paid on what have subsequently turned out to be ‘questionable or toxic’ investments. These are perfectly justifiable initiatives, but what about the government ministers, surely they are equally culpable? Leaving aside the issue of regulation and so on (pre-bust), government ministers ordered a massive injection of taxpayer cash into banks without fully understanding the liabilities and obligations therein. At best, it demonstrates incompetence of the highest order and at worst, that they do not appear, based on the evidence currently available, to have demonstrated a reasonable standard of care.

This current political grandstanding and rhetoric is nothing more than a smokescreen designed to divert attention from the incompetent management of the whole banking crisis by members of this government. New Labour ministers have proven themselves to be incapable of humility, unable to accept any form of personal responsibility and aggressive towards anyone who would question their intent. That is arrogance in its most basic and crude form, the people of this country must not let them get away with it, government ministers must be held to account and accept moral and legal responsibility for their actions. Anything less would be an outrage to the people that will have to pay the price over the coming decades.

Though I am no expert on the stock market crash of 1929 or the Great Depression that followed, what a pity that senior bankers and politicians did not study this subject and learn some of the lessons. There are so many parallels that it is uncanny and implies that people who should know better never learn their lessons.

In the run up to the Great Depression, ordinary people were allowed to purchase shares, whereas in the past it had been an exclusive club. In doing so, they increased demand and share prices started their relentless rise. This started to encourage more and more people to buy shares and, you’ve guessed it, the prices started to rise even further. The inexorable rise in share prices encouraged people to start to borrow in order that they could take advantage of the wealth creation that the stock market appeared to provide. The vast majority of these ordinary people had absolutely no idea how the stock market worked, it just looked like a one way bet. Brokers extended credit to share purchasers, in what became know as ‘margins’ whereby the purchaser could buy for example, $60,000 worth of shares, with just $6,000 of cash, the rest was borrowed.

The people of America felt rich, lifestyles improved after the austerity of the first world war and few people raised any doubts, those that did, such as President Hoover, tended to keep it to themselves, rather than be see as the Cassandra. Millions of people were encouraged to invest in the new gold rush that was the New York Stock Exchange, with little or no knowledge of the risks and inevitably with a ringing in their ears that you have to be ‘in it, to win it’. Banks and brokers stoked the money fever by extending loans secured on the shares. Inevitably the bubble burst, some were smart enough or lucky enough to get out before the crash, but they were few and far between. The vast majority of people lost all of their savings. There followed
the Great Depression, which lead to mass unemployment and affected virtually every corner of the world and it lasted 10 years. Some would argue that it also encouraged fascism and communism, if true, then it could well have been a precursor to the second world war.

If we exchange shares for houses, the parallels are uncanny. Many people have jumped on the housing bandwagon for fear of being left behind and a concern that if they were not a property owner, then they were nothing. In fact, there is some irony with that last statement because, as we all know, if you went to a bank and were a home owner, even if you owed £300k on your house, you were more likely to be able to secure another loan, than if you had no such liabilities because you rented. Somehow, owning a home had become the primary goal of a good proportion of the people of this country, actively encouraged by the banks. Loan to Value (LTV) ratios increased from around 75% to, in some cases, 125%. This implied that the banks felt that their investment was safe, because house prices would continue to rise, which meant that in a relatively short period of time, their risk would be covered by the rise in house prices.

If the banks felt that way, why would the buyers not? The ratios were also increased, allowing people to buy a house with multiples or 5 or 6 times their earnings, where previously this had typically been 2.5 times joint, or 3 times a single income. If that were not enough, many of the banks introduced ‘buy to let’ schemes, which allowed people with little or no money to build up a property portfolio in no time and of course, lead to an even greater demand for properties, leading to a further increase in house prices. So, everyone was making money, homeowners, the banks, mortgage companies, estate agents and of course, your friend and mine Gordon Brown, in the form of the Treasury.

After the 1929 stock market crash, Hoover introduced the Securities & Exchange commision to regulate US markets, this had the desired affect. However, over the past 20 years or so, the rules and regulations have been relaxed, seen as no longer necessary and much of what we witness in the United States today can be attributed to the easing of those regulations. Similarly, the much vaunted deregulation of the City was also a pre-cursor to the problems we all face today. Light regulation and a hand-off approach by government and the regulators has allowed the banks to enter very high risk transactions which many people struggle to understand. Yet, in doing so, they have clearly bet everything on it, presumably because they also though they couldn’t lose. Now, clearly all of us must take personal responsibility for our respective levels of borrowings, but easy money is difficult to refuse especially when it is being rammed down your throat on a daily basis, in the newspapers, on TV, in the shops and via direct mail campaigns.

However, when people hold senior positions, in banks, commerce and government, we could all be forgiven for believing that they are well read, experienced, shrewd and knowledgeable. In fact, we tend to take it for granted, how else would they have secured senior positions with such huge responsibilities? As chancellor, Gordon Brown in particular and the Labour government in general have let us down, their collective naivety lulled us all into a sense of false security, with Gordon Brown using the oft repeated mantra that his government policies would lead to an end of “Tory boom and bust”.

We can be forgiven for believing that a man in such a position would be best placed to know whether that was true or not, but instead, we have all come to realise, that politicians do not earn their position because of their knowledge, but instead, where they sit in the party. In other words, they learn on the job. Imagine placing a 10 year old in charge of a London bus if you will! Similarly, bankers have created new financial products, which are so complicated, that few, if any, could actually understand the risks associated with bundling mortgage securities. At best their actions could be described as reckless, but a far better description maybe of a desperate gambler playing for high stakes.

The regulators appear to have either been overwhelmed at the scale of these new securities or, more likely, unable to understand the complexities. As a consequence, those that were entrusted with our financial security, government ministers, regulators and banks, have seriously let the people of this country down, as well as shareholders, many of whom are you and I with pension funds invested in the stock market.

What is particularly galling is the fact that no-one wants to accept responsibility. On top of that, the same people that got us into this mess are, for the most part, still in the same positions. Asking us to believe that they have all the answers. Even though, had they studied their subject matter better and read up on the stock market crash of 1929 and the Great depression, many of the problems we are facing today could have been anticipated and perhaps even avoided. Governments around the world want us to believe that their solutions will work, but how do they really know, what confidence can we have in their solutions? They are spending £trillions on propping up banks, business and economies, but all of this money is borrowed, have they learnt nothing?

The rest of us are having to tighten our belts, but our governments are spending our money in what appears to be a last throw of the dice. They are all frightened of another depression, aren’t we all, but sometimes it is necessary for a period of reflection, instead, governments around the world appear to be thrashing around, panicking in a last throw of the dice. We all find ourselves asking where will it all end, not when?

We must all learn lessons from this. But one fundamental lesson is that no member of parliament should be allowed to take up a position unless they have prior experience. For example, no current cabinet minister has ever run their own business, so what do they know of the problems being faced by business people? When was the last time that an experienced person was placed in charge of the second largest employer in the world, the National Health Service? Take a look at Miliband, he is wet behind the ears, lacks depth and credibility, he may be ’smooth’ but he does not look like someone that is well read. In fact, he even managed to offend the Indian government on his last visit, are these the sort of people we want to be representing us on the world stage? What of Jacqui Smith, she finds it difficult to string a sentence together has allowed the police and other agencies to trample all over our civil liberties and lacks any obvious gravitas? Little wonder that we are in a mess.

In my view, government ministers and bankers must be called to account because they have demonstrated what appears to be a reckless disregard for the interests, respectively of the people of this country and the interests of their shareholders.

It is a time for change and this must include a look at how or on what basis members of parliament are given key cabinet posts. In no other business or industry I know of do people with little or no experience get elevated to such senior positions based on nothing other than a handshake. Never again should the people of this country be lead by donkeys. We will come out the other side, most likely in spite of this government intervention rather than because of them, but when we do, the people’s voice must be heard. We must demand change.

When the dust settles, governments around the world need to reflect on precisely how a situation arose, where taxpayers were required to bail out struggling banks and insurers. This should be wide ranging and lead to both regulation and prosecution.

It is insufficient in the extreme to state that the stock markets require regulation, the truth is that executives of some of the largest banks and insurers in the world have acted recklessly and in return, have profited through bonuses and dividend payments. They have manufactured products that could be traded for profit, even though 10 years or so ago, these types of trades did not exist, in fact, some are so complicated, that even financial experts and city observers have struggled to explain how they worked.

It must be remembered, that the executives of these banks and insurance companies were charged with a fiduciary duty to look after their shareholders interests and act responsibly. From what I can see, they have created products that allowed them to make short-term profits on traded mortgage securities and the like. In many cases, shareholders have lost everything, many of whom are pension companies, which means that the ultimate losers will be all those that have invested their hard earned money in a pension fund and of course, the taxpayer.

Few can argue, that the actions of many of these top executives has been reckless in the extreme, because previously solid businesses have now had to be bailed, whether through nationalisation or central bank loans. With the position, salary, share options, dividends and bonuses, must come the responsibility. Anyone who has been party to the decisions that have lead to the failure of the business they were responsible for, should be required to forfeit any profits they received.

During these tough times, there is a need for cool heads, particularly from government, but we will come out the other side. The government’s however, must act now, by freezing the assets of all executives who are believed to have been party to this reckless behaviour, before they are allowed to salt away their assets, as they surely will. The public will not forgive government, for allowing these people to protect their assets and avoid paying the price for their reckless behavior.

This is not about starting a blame game, nor is it a witch-hunt, both of which may even be justifiable. It is a method by which government, on behalf of the people, can make clear, that reckless behaviour, for short-term profit, which leads to business failure has a price. In the UK, company directors can already be held personally responsible if they have continued to trade whilst insolvent, based on some of the recent examples of spectacular business failures, it is difficult to see how some of the banking executives could claim that their business was solvent.

Government must use existing legislation to investigate and if necessary, charge reckless company executives. If necessary, they must introduce further legislation to increase their powers in such circumstances, but in a first move, they must seek to freeze most or all of the assets of these failed bankers and their cronies. It does not matter if they have been donors to party funds, politicians responsibilities are to the electorate, not a few failed bankers. The predict, that the first party to promise to freeze the assets of these bankers, pending an investigation, will receive a massive boost in the polls, so even if they don’t do it because it is right, they could try it for the poll boost!