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PrisonerNumber6

Listed below are comments made by PrisonerNumber6 between Monday, 15th June 2009 and Thursday, 22nd October 2009.

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Bank reform: The radical way 7:30pm on 22 Oct 2009 Hi Robert

Hope the home front is easier to resolve than the banking crisis - as we are about to enter its second and more worrying phase.

The taxpayer cannot afford to save the banks a second time. Sadly, I read the Chancellor's 2009 Budget forecasts recently. The incoming Government in June 2010 has two horrible choices.

Choice 1 - Raise income tax to at least 28p and VAT to 22.5% on all goods and services. This should raise around £50bn per annum on present employment and GDP consumption levels. This will make some capital repayments and cover interest (if levels rise to pre October 2008 levels).

Choice 2 - Assuming that tax revenues are received as per the Budget document until 2014 - then on Day 2 of the new Government - cut all budgets and benefits by 25% across the board for a 5 year term. Deeply unpopular, will risk civil unrest, strikes, etc. However, doing this will just maintain the level of Government Borrowing Debt levels at March 2009 levels! The Swedes did a similar thing in the early 1990's and have now just got their economy back on track - a 16-17 year exercise.

Either way - people would understand the medicine on offer. Introduce the UK version of Glass-Steggall and allow investment banks to invest, whilst high street banks manage depositors' money and make sensible, "real" loans to SME's who after all, account for 98% of the private sector, and employ over 50% of the UK workforce - the forgotten majority. We are in a phoney recession right now. The full force will not be seen until next year, but rest assured, it will be horrible for everyone.

Finally, let the next Government initiate a full tax audit of all present MP's in Parliament today, subject to the new Bribery Bill being enacted into Parliament and also making sure the current crop of MP's are subject to the Theft Act (like the rest of the population), not the watered down MPs’ expenses and allowances law, The Parliamentary Standards Bill introduced on 23 June 2009. What a joke. HMRC should be given wide ranging powers. Not enough auditing of MP's expenses after the exposure of the abuse and misuse of public money - our taxpayers money.

Look forward to your return when things calm down at home.
Brown and bonuses 10:50pm on 27 Sep 2009 So what? Will anything change? Doubt it very much. Same old same old. Meantime, the fires of Rome burn as Nero fiddles!
Business still being crunched by banks 11:25am on 23 Jul 2009 Put simply Robert, we have to live within our means. Therefore. UK and world trade will slow as the debt fat West goes on a slimming programme to reduce consumption. Growth will come from Asia as they aspire to become as debt fat as us!
Why banks must be allowed to die 11:41pm on 26 Jun 2009 Pick the bank where deposits are greater than advances. Then try (its a big ask) and work out the contingent liabilities risk from CDO's etc. Not many to choose from. Otherwise, mattress bank beckons.
Goodwin: The final pension sum 6:31pm on 18 Jun 2009 We should, as tax payers, stop worrying about one man. He has abided by the minimum terms of his commercial employment contract. Draw a line in the sand. The fact is we bailed out a privately owned bank (in fact several). There is red ink all over the Red Book. We know that, and we will be paying for it for decades. It was the lesser of two evils, the other too horrible to contemplate.

More importantly for our democracy, what about a full independent forensic tax investigation of 648 MP'sm supervised by HMRC, now that the expenses details are published, embellished by the work of the Daily Telegraph journalists under FOIA? Strikes me that there must be a few situations that might breach either the ICTA, Theft Act, Fraud Act or other fiscal legislation (in any combination) by at least one or more of our MP's. In a private company, actions taken against miscreants would have been swifter and more severe with the law of the land as the ultimate arbiter. All of us have to abide by the law, including 648 in Westminster Village.

Will the new speaker in the Commons be brave and instigate this to reinvigorate British democracy?
Rebuilding the foundations of finance 7:49pm on 17 Jun 2009 Until banks write off ALL OF THEIR DOUBTFUL DEBT, the true extent of the losses will remain a mystery. Sounds to me like turkeys voting for Xmas then.

Perhaps some old fashioned remedies are needed. Banks were designed to be the custodians of our money and to lend to non related businesses to help those businesses grow and evolve. Methinks our bankers forgot some simple golden rules.

Banking IS boring. Please let it return!
Britain's media obsession 1:04pm on 16 Jun 2009 A laudable attempt to wake up and smell today's commercial coffee!

However, the Government has still missed the real issue of today. SME's are being given a slow death by the continued lack of credit from banks and financial service companies, after the Government bail out. As SME's employ over 95% of UK adults outside the public sector employees, and create the most wealth proportionately to the UK GDP, then is it beyond the wit of Government to get this sorted out NOW! Without credit, the UK is an engine starved of oil.
Is Owen still worth a gamble? 2:35pm on 15 Jun 2009 As an outside bet - Wigan to sign Owen. Now that would be something!
Secrets of the fixture computer 12:28pm on 15 Jun 2009 Never had fixture problems in the Jurassic era (i.e. without PC's). So why the big song and dance. Perhaps too many competitions and too many external demands methinks.
Should we trust the regulators? 12:26pm on 15 Jun 2009 Where is the investigative, non politically aligned leadership within our regulatory bodies? I can't see any. Can you?

If we had non partizan regulators with wide ranging powers, perhaps some recent mistakes might have been avoided or the resultant risks minimised.

However, a cautionary note. Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely. The regulators need to demonstrate the highest levels of honesty, integrity and value. Where are they today? Discuss!

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