Put bank genie back in bottle

IT IS time our politicians and civil servants learned the basics of the banking business – but not from their banking friends and lobbyists. Top bankers constantly reassure politicians that economic collapse can’t happen here and customers believe their deposits are guaranteed by the State, but we all conveniently forget that we are the State and we are the guarantors. So far no one has expropriated our savings directly as in Cyprus, but depositors have been bailing out all the banks for years – it is done by inflation and derisory interest rates.

Economic crisis and austerity may be the symptoms, but financial jiggery pokery is the cause. It’s all down to role reversal – the banks used to be accountable to the government – but the winners will be those who bite the bullet and put this genie back in the bottle while they still can.

R F Morrison, Helensburgh