Taxpayers could be given £1,000 worth of shares in bailed-out banks under radical new plan Read mo

reply to post by TrueBrit


Its a very old game. Read the "Prince." I dont really think its as complicated as we would like to believe, most of us having been fooled by it at one point.

Control of information, dividing those who should be natural allies with various tactics, appealing to vanity, ego, and greed, playing off fear, selling the idea that "my interests are your intrests," and making multiple moves instead of one short leap, so that only the patient and those with good memory and strategic skills can follow you.

Its really not so terribly complex. It works so well not because its complicated, but because the qualities of human nature it exploits are well wired in by nature.

People will never learn.

Thatcher sold off all the nationalised industries.
Effectively she sold something to the people which they already owned.
The ordinary man in the street made a quick little profit, their shares ended up in the hands of the bankers and investors who bankroll The Conservative Party.
We are now in the position where we have no mining industry to speak of, what steel industry we have is foreign owned as are all the utility companies which are steadily draining money out of this country.

In addition she sold off all council houses, which in itself wasn't a bad thing, but no new council houses were built forcing young families into buying private housing which they couldn't really afford.
This resulted in record repossessions and crippling debt and fuelled the spiralling house prices making vast amounts for mortgage lenders and further increasing debt etc.

We are still paying the price for these policies.

But we'll fall for it again!

reply to post by spacedonk


That’s all well and good but it would be wrong to hope for any great impact on the cuts; the spending deficit last year was around £145bn*1, of this around £95bn is structural. The cuts are being made to bring this figure down and a short term budget increase would not change the need to reduce overall spending for the long term. The money could have an impact on the national debt but as this stands at ~£900bn*2 it wouldn’t be much of an impact.

The report (p3, “Option One: A Conventional Reprivatisation)*3 makes a decent argument for why simply selling the government’s shares would not bring in much of a profit and could potentially result in a loss. If your aim is to recoup the cost of the bailout then the CPS’ plan offers a pretty good way of doing that; under their plans the government would get the cost of the bailout back as anything under the floor price will go to the government, they will also get an additional 18% in capital gains tax (of those that don’t sell early) and the tax payer will get the profit over and above the floor price, minus capital gains, that they otherwise would not get if the govt simply floated the shares they hold.

I understand the sentiment behind the negativity in this thread but it seems o me that you’re cutting off your nose to spite your face. If at the end of the day this approach brings in more money for both government and taxpaying individuals then isn't it the prudent thing to do.

That’s not to mention the fact that it would make the public (not the government) the majority shareholder in RBS, if you wanted to do something about bonuses and low lending levels then this would provide a massive tool to achieve those ends.

This scheme is not without problems or valid criticism but I don’t think the ones mentioned in this thread are particularly major ones.

Some criticism I just don’t buy, like the idea that this will quash all the negative feeling towards and scrutiny of the banks; the British are a cynical lot, in my opinion to their detriment, and I think the general reaction to this would be “about time” and nothing more. I don't believe we'll see a call to deregulate the banks again or anything of the sort.

The idea that it’s not enough is again being petty; it’s more than you would otherwise get. It may be a bad apology but it’s better than a cold screw you.

It won’t change anyone’s tax band; any gains will be subject to capital gains and not income tax. Only dividends could affect someone’s income tax band but the amount that people would be getting would be relatively tiny, so unless you’re earning £39,851 then it’s not really going to affect you.

This is nothing like the right to buy; council houses were a resource that the government needed and would continue to need. The government does not need to maintain ownership of the banks and will re-privatise Lloyds and RBS (and other assets) regardless, the only question is how they do that.

*1 www.statistics.gov.uk...

*2 www.statistics.gov.uk...

*3 www.cps.org.uk...

reply to post by Freeborn


Do you think we should keep Lloyds, RBS and the others as national banks?

reply to post by Mike_A


To be honest I don't really know; I'm not really clued up enough on banking to give a truly qualified opinion.

And that's the key to the everyday person's problems with banking and investment etc.
We've never really had the time or opportunity to learn about these institutions etc and as such are easily baffled by bull#.

I could say that now we have bailed these banks out we should at least get some sort of payback for our money but I'm not that naive that I think it's as easy and straight forward as that.

Personally I believe that increased Nationalisation wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing provided they were managed professionally and the profits generated were genuinely re-invested into the country.

I suspect I maybe in a very small minority that thinks that way.