Teresa Hunter - Crippled economy leaves us without a leg to stand on

Published on Saturday 11 October 2008 18:40

IT WAS like watching a man whose legs have been mutilated in a car wreck. With gangrene well advanced, he has no choice but to cut them off to stop it spreading and killing him.

For a brief delusional period, the surgery seems to work. The pain goes and, as I understand it, the patient can even feel his legs for a while.

After a bit, though, the trauma and horror of what he has done hits home. The pain which follows can be unbearable.

In time he comes to terms with his loss, gets some false legs and learns to walk again. But progress is agonisingly slow and he stumbles often.

I reckon we are somewhere around stage two of this process. We've had the accident, thanks to incompetent politicians and bankers who bear more than a passing resemblance to testosterone-driven boy racers who cause such havoc on our roads.

We are now stuck in the delusional period, where we congratulate ourselves for our brilliance in sorting the problem out, regardless of cost.

Don't get me wrong: the rescue package which the Government hastily threw together to stop the entire economy imploding was a masterstroke, if long overdue. Similarly, how could we but welcome the interest rate cut, other than to say it didn't go far enough.

But I was horrified to watch Labour's backbenchers laughing and cracking in-jokes to each other, like it was any other day in the fourth form at St Twittians, when the package was discussed during Prime Minister's Question Time. Was further proof needed that the average backbencher has failed to grasp the gravity of the position we are in. Just like the man who has yet to realise his legs have gone.

Politicians and bankers have crippled our economy, but we will be the ones who pay the price, through higher taxes, rising unemployment and falling living standards.

Fire and ice

WHILE we are at it, add to the list of those who should be lined up and shot local authority chief executives and treasury officers who invested millions of pounds of our money in Icelandic banks.

Some of these people earn in excess of 200,000 a year. Again, I have been shocked at the sheer effrontery they have shown when one by one they have appeared on television to say it wasn't their fault, they took perfectly sound decisions and how could they have known there was a risk to their money, by which they mean our money. What on earth do they think they get paid such colossal sums for? Is elementary reading not the first qualification for such an obscene salary paid for by the public purse. Surely they have the reception-class skill of being able to listen and learn from the television.

On June 15 we ran an article entitled "Beware fragile foreign legion" in which we warned: "There has been a lot of speculation about the strength of Icelandic banks, and in February international credit rating agency Moody's described them as financially 'fragile'… if any Icelandic bank operating in the UK fell into difficulty in the same way that Northern Rock did, savers' deposits could be at risk."

The article continued with more warnings and concerns about the Icelandic banks and wider economy. Others newspapers, although by no means all, also spotted the risks and issued warnings, as did some broadcasters, notably Channel Four News.

But I have been outraged at the gunboat diplomacy which Gordon Brown has engaged in on our behalf, in his usual attempt to push any liability as far away from his door as possible. Is the man demented?

What on earth has the average person living in Iceland got to do with the stupidity of the idiots running our local authorities. If I want to go to war, I won't be crossing any water to do it.

Allow fair warning

FINALLY, back to politicians and bankers. Another of their less than endearing qualities is that they can be highly litigious if challenged. Like many other journalists, I have been threatened by litigation by both groups, but not by any others inside or outside the financial arena.

There has been much talk of the need for tighter regulation. While they are at it, I would argue, and I realise this will be controversial, that financial journalists need far greater freedom to tell it like it is without risk of being sued.

Then I could have told you weeks ago to take your money out of Iceland.

Bankers have been allowed to destroy shareholder value, and wipe billions off our savings and pensions with no comeback whatsoever.

Yet they slap writs on anyone who dares to make the slightest criticism.