End of the line

Today's startling announcement from RBS that, despite reporting a £5 bn loss, they plan to pay £600 m in bonuses, is the last straw.  I've been a customer of the Royal Bank since 1968 (annus mirabilis), with a gap of a few months in 1972 when I experienced how dreadful the Midland's service and attitude were, and went back to a provincial RBS branch where the manager and I were on first-name terms.  (He was subsequently demoted, not, I think post hoc ergo propter hoc.)  I couldn't complain of their handling of two recent instances in which my credit card details had been used dishonestly, but the shenannigans in the investment banking operation and at top level in recent years have disgusted me, and for the most part, their retail service in recent years has been somewhere between lacklustre and slapdash.  I'm interviewing a successor candidate on Monday.

RBS is, of course, an organisation owned 82% by the taxpayer.  Government nevertheless does nothing for fear of losing the authors of the current banking sector disaster to the Asia Pac region or North America (stand not upon the order of your going, I'd say).  And doubtless individuals in government fear antagonising their fat-cat sponsors.  The EU is hardly covering itself in glory by sanctioning bonuses of twice salary in the banking sector.  That is the kind of remuneration package appropriate to unscrupulous used car salesmen, not to the stewards of loyal customers' money.  Things might look different if the banks were lending to small and innovative businesses that could help rescue the economy.  Well, the Tories wrecked the mining and manufacturing sectors (with a helping hand from the dinosaurs in  the trade union movement, granted): it's logical that they're now sacrificing the financial services sector to the god of market forces.  I can barely bring myself to touch a £20 note with its graven image of Adam Smith - not that I get the chance too often.  Hammering the poor will obviously compensate...

End of February too - my least favourite month, when my Weltanschauung is at its blackest and my joints at their sorest.  Still, the pension is in and the days are lengthening, so things are starting to look up.