Bankers! Give the uk back our money!

[kayce]

Originally Posted by justleanitupabit

And also what is hugely annoying and very important is that the part the general public played in this whole mess is totally and utterly ignored by all politicians because they are not brave enough to mention it.

As it's also ignored by the general population. Everything's great while the money's rolling in and handouts are being delivered, but once the money trail dries up everyone finds reason to scream and kick their feet. Economics is never as easy as people tend to make it.

[SlowOne]

Kayce, I agree more with MattR's summary than yours, apart from the post above - economics is made by people - us - and we move much faster than Governments who can't keep up!!

Thatcher didn't kill bad industries, she killed all industries. Along with the things that Matt mentions, she also killed the Export Credit Guarantee Department who allowed firms to venture into new markets by guaranteeing (basically insuring, for which firms paid a premium) their payments for work done. At the same time, the Germans and Japanese expanded their ECGDs, with the Japanese (for example) paying their firms for exports within 30 days so that the Japanese companies could offer their customers 180 days credit - you could sell their product before you had to pay for it!

That allowed a lot of German and Japanese companies to expand. If they were crap, they folded anyway, if they small but good, they expanded. Small good British manufacturing companies just folded due to the recession here in the UK from '81 to '86 and withdrawal of the ECGD support.

Governments are slow to recognise that we have become the cottage industry of the World. We cannot compete in volume markets, but we can earn a very good living form these so-called small high-tech companies if only we would support their R&D and production processes development activities. this Government is starting to recognise it with the new High Value Technology Innovation Centres focusing on manufacturing, automotive and process industries.

The issue with Bombardier is interesting. The EU Rules for this type of contract require a bidder to meet all conditions of the contract. Bombardier could not raise the finance for the leasing part of the contract, that's why they failed. Siemens on the other hand did raise that funding, with not a little help from their Government. If the requirement had been to buy the trains, the Government would have been ale to choose Bombardier on a technical level with Siemens. It was another case of unintended consequences being ignored by the Civil Service, irrespective of the Government in power!

(As an aside, this method of keeping things of our balance sheet (the Private Finance Initiative) is costing this country a lot of money. As an example, a hospital costing £100m to build, when let under a PFI contract to build and run the hospital for 20 years, costs nearly £500m cash that we, the taxpayer, have to find. And we still have to pay to staff the hospital, but the kit, etc.)

(As another aside, it was this trick, developed by McKinsey, that the Greeks use to meet the requirements to join the Euro!! Which sort of brings us back to those bloody bankers again! They might not have our money, but they seem to have us by the balls!!)

[Welshy40]

Originally Posted by Rebelrc

As title says

Actually you should be saying Labour put us in this mess, now lets get out of europe before it goes tits up. We can start a petition and over 200000 people can have their say and this will have to be discussed again.

Bankers helped but what you don't hear are these traders don't all get a basic wage, and live off the commission that they make.

Its a really tough industry and yes they are over paid but the hard workers and very lucky deserve all they get.

You missed off the credit card companies that started this off and has a huge debt behind it still, Labour kept really quite about that, i wonder why. Too many idiots are now being given cards and don't have the brains or capital to pay it off.

Then there are those people like on tv who think they are rich and not very bright and as an example buy a big house that wouldn't cost the earth to put right and make it a nice home and instead decide to go and knock it down and build a new one in its place, no sense there at all and money down the drain as well and I guess a big debt and you cant blame the banking industry on that either.

[SlowOne]

Originally Posted by Welshy40

Actually you should be saying Labour put us in this mess, now lets get out of europe before it goes tits up. We can start a petition and over 200000 people can have their say and this will have to be discussed again.

Yeah, and there goes another pink blob with wings...

We've had a petition with well over 100,000 signatures - to bring down the price of fuel. No debate, none planned. More than that for the one about immigration - and the Leader of the House says that is unlikely to be debated. Start as many petitions as you like, I have a fiver that says the debates will not happen.

Get out of Europe, eh? You are seriously considering taking us out of the union that means we can buy and sell 40% of the goods we produce without any duties or extra taxes (beyond VAT) and letting them set a range of import duties that will price us out of all these markets? That will do more damage to this country than any banker has ever managed.

I am sure that, if put to the vote, this country would take us out. At least that would mean that the depression and the following default on our debts wouldn't be followed by a load of complaints about the Government on forums - we would have done it to ourselves. Google 'Argentina default' if you want to know what happens when a country defaults on its debts - the situation still hanging over Greece - and everyone really loses all their money.

I appreciate there are things about the European Union we could do without, but again, Government could choose to do as Norway and France - choose not to implement all European legislation - and save us all the agony. We could also do more by choosing not to buy food that is subject to this legislation and demand local produce. We can't be arsed, it's all too much trouble! Nonetheless, voting to leave the EU is the best way to ensure that a depression results and you lose your job.

[Welshy40]

How much money are we ploughing into Europe?. I think that a lot of people want out and I am one of them and if we went to a vote we would not be part of Europe. Tony Blair who is an idiot as well as Brown (who both hated one another) who ruined this country by selling our only valuable asset the gold bullion reserve that we had (he should be hung for that) and they both didnt go for the vote because they were advised they would lose.

Unions, they ruined all the businesses in the country and now we have zero British car firms, hardly any coal mines and etc etc and proves a point. Unions are a bad thing, funny that they get greedy and go on strike, but much funnier when they lose their jobs TFL underground will be next when they implement the robot driving trains. No more tube strikes and thats brilliant and funny.

When Europe falls and it will do you really want to be in a never ending recession due to this badly run fiasco. Do you know that the European HQ is in Germany for half a year and then they ship all the staff and equipment to the offices in Begium do to some stupid regulation they have and costs the European tax payers including us millions of Euros just for that. Daft and thats not the only one, there are more.

Why should we bail out Greece, Spain, Italy and the rest as its their greed that did this, not ours.

[Col]

I've not read such a small minded opinion as that for quite a while!

[kayce]

Originally Posted by Col

I've not read such a small minded opinion as that for quite a while!

+1

[justleanitupabit]

Originally Posted by Col

I've not read such a small minded opinion as that for quite a while!

Originally Posted by kayce

+1

I'd prefer to say uninformed, which proves how biased the reporting has been.

There is no one single cause of this part of the financial downturn.

"Banks" lent too much money and assumed they'd get a good return ad-finitum.
"People" borrowed what they couldn't afford.
"Governments" blew their reserves and borrowed at ridiculous levels for political mileage. (The shortlived child trust funds is a great example.)

Gordon Brown flogging most of the countries gold reserves, whilst annoying and ridiculous is a drop in the ocean compared to the countries debts.

[SlowOne]

+1 to Col's comment, but in the interests of balance...

Winston Churchill (Liberal and then Tory) proposed a united Europe in order to prevent any country suffering the same as Germany under Hitler, and the rest of Europe too.

Harold Wilson (Labour) promoted that view and facilitated much of the original treaty that created the European Community.

Ted Heath (Tory) held the referendum that took us into Europe and signed us up to the original European Act.

Margaret Thatcher (Tory) signed the Maastricht Treaty that gave us the European Working Directive, the Human Rights Act and the current balance of payments into and out of the EU.

Gordon Brown and Tony Blair (Labour) did bugger all to change any of that, they just carried on as the four previous Prime Ministers had before them. If they are guilty of anything, it is masterly inactivity where Europe is concerned.

So, just how can Blair and Brown be to blame for our position in Europe?

Gordon Brown's crimes against this country are manifest and plentiful, but selling the gold reserves was waaaayyyyy down the list. Top of my list was the taxing of share dividends paid into pension funds. Raking in £20bn a year on that little jaunt has cost us, people who have pensions, something north of £200bn in lost pension payments over our lifetimes. Second on my list was his idiotic attitude to the financial sector with his belief that the days of boom and bust were over. The complete lack of regulation of the financial sector was one of many reasons that we are where we are.

As for the money we pay to Europe, our net contribution is about £4bn. What with the rebate we get back, and the funding we receive for infrastructure projects that is not subject to our Government's political interference, it pales into insignificance compared to the £31bn a year in interest we have to pay on our current loans. Which, again, brings us back to those bloody bankers!

Sorry to let some facts get in the way of a good story...