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Listed below are comments made by GTBBUK between Tuesday, 29th July 2008 and Friday, 24th July 2009.

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Business still being crunched by banks 09:38am on 24 Jul 2009 Very simply, the economy is returning to where it would have been had we not had Gordon's credit boom and bust. House prices fall, businesses that were built solely on the credit boom go bust. Why should more sensible lenders that weren't throwing money at the likes of the housing market suddenly be responsible for reflating Gordon's bubble?
Massive mortgage squeeze 09:20am on 25 Nov 2008 So having 'bust' HBOS, Sir James now wants to do the whole country by suggesting the same approach to lending.

It has now been said numerous times on this blog and hundreds of others that house prices are just too high. Even the BBC has woken up to this and is answering serious questions of Darling and Brown.

Net lending needs to turn negative in order for the market to return to anywhere near normality. For the last few years lending has been reckless and now it is payback time.

In the meantime, Darling and Brown are confused about whether this whole mess was the banks fault for the reckless lending in the first place, or whether the banks should be forced to lend at those levels again. Yesterday's PBR was actually quite reassuring that despite the hot air, Darling seemed to suggest nothing to prop up the housing market.
Newsnight special - Monday 13th October 6:28pm on 13 Oct 2008 Fundamentally the Government is to blame for encouraging the BoE to reduce rates in 2003 to stimulate lending for purchases. Eddie George revealed this was the case just over a year ago.

Having said that, banks then leant irresponsibly, dreaming up new products on a day by day basis, and justifying them by claiming that they were only meeting consumer demand.

To top this off, the Great British Consumer took advantage of the lax credit rules and borrowed and spent to the hilt.

We now have an economic policy based on bailing out all the above, while the genuine prudent are left to fend for themselves.
We own the banks 08:56am on 13 Oct 2008 Could you clarify the 'lending at 2007 levels' comment please? Does this genuinely mean that the government are never going to let house prices fall and thus guaranteeing that no one will ever lose money from buying a house?
6pm. Bank bosses to meet Darling 3:43pm on 06 Oct 2008 Banks have leant more money than they have got. In order to stop them going pork side up, the Great British Tax Payer will give the aforementioned banks some money in return for a bit of their badly managed business. As a result, we are now all bankers. :o)
Bank of England must lend 08:55am on 25 Sep 2008 Robert. Have you stopped to consider that the interbank lending rate might be at the correct level given risk and inflation, and that the BoE rate is incorrect? Effectively the banks have taken interest rates out of the control of the government, for the time being at least. We are back to the core problem, people have borrowed too much at too low interest rates in the belief that nothing would ever change. For individuals, this is 'payback' time. For lenders, it's 'please payback what you have borrowed' time.
Why banks won't lend 10:58am on 10 Sep 2008 The banks have reduced mortagage lending because now they have to tolerate more of the risk themselves, the fact that people cannot repay their loans has become an issue to them. Cue outcry for taxpayer money to prop up prices where they are.

Of course there is a much easier answer to getting the market moving again than risking billions of pounds taxpayers money. Simon Embley of LSL Property Services has stated that prices need to fall by 25% in cash terms this year and further next for transactions to return to normal volumes. Let it happen and legislate to ensure we don't get into this mess agin.
Fannie, Freddie, Cheshire and Derbyshire 08:31am on 08 Sep 2008 Strangely enough all BBC news reports this morning have focussed on how this will get the UK housing market on the up again. There seems to be little understanding that this was a bail-out of last resort and that even Bush (if I remember correctly) said that the financial system was only 2 weeks away from complete collapse.

Maybe the BBC is merely reflecting the country's obsession with rising house prices, (though the obsession is certainly supported by the current government), but isn't it about time it's reporting became more even handed?
Treasury's mortgage rescue plan 09:02am on 29 Jul 2008 Does Darling really not want to prevent house prices falling? Surely the basis of Labour's re-election strategy is to keep the majority of the populous happy through ever rising house prices and the supposed free money it brings?
The reason no-one wants MBSs any more is that hey have been proved not to work with house prices at the level they are. A small rise in interest rates has left the country nearly crippled. Whilst some like to blame the interest rises, the real problem is that banks have over-lent and people have over-borrowed. Rather than allowing the situation to correct itself naturally, we are now going through the (political) motions of trying to prop up a financial dodo. There is still a focus on trying to provide lending that meets current prices rather than allowing prices to fall to a level supported by sensible lending.
Incidentally, mortgages are still widely available on better terms than they were 10 years ago. People have become so accustomed to easy credit that they have forgotten that the last 5 years have been the exception rather than the norm. As an example, when borrowing a six figure sum, is it really unreasonable to be asked to put down a deposit?

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