Bonuses Are Back

Have we survived the worst of the Credit Crunch? At this moment things do not look too good. Over the last couple of weeks we have seen the stock markets heading down again and it looks like the FTSE 100 index could re-explore the levels of last November. There is no doubt that there are still many serious problems; most of them with the banks. But it seems that the banks have decided not to be thrown off course by the present - or any - situation and are [a] continuing to pay ludicrous salaries and [b] gearing up for large bonus handouts. We the British tax payers are supporting UK banks with a potential sum of £1,300,000,000,000; we, the tax payers who are struggling to live in a time of declining incomes, falling wages and devaluing assets; we the tax payers who are struggling to pay mortgages on houses gathering negative equity; we, the tax payers, who are in this mess because of the banks; we the tax payers who expected the government to come up with real proposals to control the banks and have been offered nothing but a government white paper containing 175 blank pages. What are they going to actually do beyond setting up an extra quango to co-ordinate the activities of the treasury, the FSA and the Bank of England. It will give a lot of bureaucrats the opportunity of attending some more meetings but what it will do is buried in the long grass.

Even the bank friendly land of Switzerland has insisted that banks increase their reserves to 18% rather than the 5 - 7% that was common. All the British government has done is identify a need to increase the reserves. Without a crack-down on this at least the banks can carry on playing casinos with our money. It's business as usual. That's alright then.