And another thing…

The problem is Tom that Brown changed all the banking regulations and it has failed. That is the problem.He must be the first port of call, then the others.

I must be getting annoying, but still:

With regards to the first paragraph, you mean PFIs and the like, right? You’re surely not saying tht private healthcare doesn’t bother you? Honestly, you must be the first ever New Labour minister to become more right wing after being sacked.

Just so you know: YOU ARE A MEMBER OF A DEMOCRATIC SOCIALIST PARTY.

Andrew F – to be fair, I’ve held these views since long before I was a minister. If I can promise a constituent that he or she will get a new hip earlier if it’s done by a private company than by the NHS, then provided he or she doesn’t have to pay, why on earth would I opt for the non-private route? It’s delivery and outcomes that matter, not some daft ideological argument about private v public.

Over 100,000 complaints unanswered. Me – I’ve now been waiting 6 months to find out when I get the hip op which is crippling me. Age 57.

Well done, New Labour. As agree the doctors, in their lovely new Mercs, Audis and Beamers. And HUGE pension hit on the country (which was not accounted for when they doubled their salaries overnight).

Yes, well done, New Labour.

Due to the bail out being run by NuLabor, with taxpayers money, the bankers & other city dealers will not suffer at all.

The plutocrats will retain all their bonuses, massive salaries and estates. The general taxpayer will be stuck with an enormous debt for the forseeable future.

Hopefully the goverment will back off from nationalising banks, though I suspect they won’t call it that.

Due to the bailout corrupt, inept bankers will be kept afloat and live to steal more. Those who ran their banks well (there are some) will not be able to profit from their good management.

The message is, steal enough money and you get away with it.

Investments can go up and down, if it looks too good to be true investigate before putting others money that you hold in trust into it.

The public servants who made these investment decisions will retire with index linked state pensions paid for by the taxpayer, no down side for them. The councillors will deny responsibility.

The goverment should back away, so what if a bank or two fails? Has this goverment bailed out failing manufacturers, no it let them fail and/or be bought by other more efficient companies (RR, Bentley, Land Rover, etc).

Should it have nationalised/bailouted Land Rover; of course not this would have been unfair to Toyota, Ford, Honda etc.

Why should banks be special cases?
Is it perhaps that Brown reckoned on getting a few nice directorships from city firms?

When local councils screw up…
————————————————————–

Yeah it must be hard running a local council when you can put your prices up 4 or 5% every year and then prosecute your customers if they don’t buy your services.

Out here (in the real world) customers look for a better product every year, and cheaper. Can you find me a council that delivers a better product every year and cheaper? (Save yourself some time, don’t bother looking, you won’t find one).

Re the banks – I am not going to defend the management, the Fred Goodwins, the Dennis Stevensons (ennobled by your Blair) et al, should all have been booted out a long time ago.

But … where was the regulation and oversight? Not even at the wheel, never mind asleep at the wheel.

Hector Sants, Mervyn, King, Captain Snot; they should all be booted out. Of the three only the last one is a cert for the chop.

Tom,
Did you know that Iceland is now, technically, bankrupt?

http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/10/09/business/icebank.php

They’ve got the begging bowl out asking the IMF and Russia to help them weather the storm that they helped create.

Is it me or does the central figure look like Ian Hislop?

Tom, I have spent the last two days teasing out the facts on something that your old dept has got so very wrong. We need much more competence in the central public sector as well.

http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=IMF+WARNS+UK&sourceid=navclient-ff&ie=UTF-8&rls=DVFD,DVFD:1970–2,DVFD:en

Multiple warnings to James Gordon Brown with regard to differing symptoms in the train wreck that is our economy.

Around 313,000 entries (yes, I know – I’ve worked on search engines – regardless, that is a LOT)

Sub-prime mortgages fingered. Not imported from the USA. Home grown.

That’s the Son Of The Manse for you. Straight as the day is long. In Gordo we trust. He is The Dear Leader.

Dearie me, Jeremy. Were you at school with GB and he bullied you, or something? So he created the recession in Ireland and is responsible for the global economic crisis? Save it for the next meeting of your association, if you don’t mind.

You don’t even read my comments – if you follow the link, you will see he was warned AGAIN AND AGAIN that what has happened would happen.

So what else can he be but personally responsible? And how would you react to him cracking up in public at the thought of another bank going, and more misery for millions?

Besides, he’s destroyed my pension.

Anyway his mates are fine

To the tune of

“I’m going to wash that man right out of my hair”

“I’m going to stick my snout right into that trough”

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/oct/12/mandelson-labour

And he’s not even answerable to Parliament.

Your kinda democracy eh Tom? Lets hope the people don’t turn on you – down my way, in the South West, the land that New Labour forgot – people are f****** furious.

OK. Lets put it this way, Tom.

Do you think that people in positions of high responsibility, with duties both of care and due diligence towards their wards – employees, citizens – should, when they foul up, be accountable for their cock-ups?

Certainly, this was the case where I have worked. Clearly, it is no longer the case, either in government or in the financial sector.

Who in government or the banks will be hurt by this crash? No-one. No, it is us who are hurting, and we haven’t seen anything yet?

What happened to personal responsibility, Tom? And how do you build a society without it?

Answer that – you have not ONCE answered any point or question I have put to you; no, I just get clever clever comments ans snide remarks, which amount really to what your mate Balls said to all of us on the subject of intolerable levels of taxation

“So what”?

(Cue smarty pants response…)

So, what are you saying, Jeremy, that you’re thinking of resigning your Labour Party membership?

(Was that smarty pants enough forya?)

Ireland? What the **** is that to do with anything?

People voted for you? We are f****d.

[...] Tom Harris backs this view (and that of the Prime Minister) when he says that heads should roll at those companies responsible for the crisis. However Holyrood Chronicles is sceptical that this will actually happen and Two Doctors is sceptical that anything good will come from the bail-out at all. [...]

Sad the decay of the L