Darling--not Brown--came up with the plan to save the banks

Kevyn Bodman

Who cares about whether it was Darling and Lady Vadera or Captain Blackadder and Lady Madonna?
The policy is what you should be analysing, not gossip about who is trying to claim credit or influence.
And talking of policy, your post is timed at 2.13pm.
I read about Phil Woolas' announcement on changes (?) to immigration policy in a daily e-mail I get from the BBC at about 3.00am.
Why haven't you commented on this? You've had plenty of time.
And it's real policy that interests a lot of people, not 'he said, she said' gossip.
A couple of commenters on other threads have questioned the quality of posts on CoffeeHouse recently.
I think all of you in the office need to raise your game.

Austin Barry

Warning: the following is the dullest sentence ever to appear in a Coffee House post:

"Mr Sands — an old friend of Lady Vadera — was joined by his finance director, Richard Meddings; Tom Scholar, a senior Treasury official; Robin Budenberg from UBS; and Michael Klein, the former chairman of Citigroup’s investment bank." Urghhhh...

hysteria

I agree with Austin and Kevym - CH has developed a wel deserved reputation for some of the more serious commentary. If we want lightweight chat, there are plenty of other sources.

biggestaspidistra

"I think all of you in the office need to raise your game."

Funny, and true. Socks up lads, it's gone 'lifestyley' in here.

Chris Rose

Brown abolished the regulation of banks by the Bank of England because it was, in the words of Charles Moore in this morning's Telegraph, 'an old-boy City network'.

The Bank has been replaced by sofa government of the worst kind. Darling seems to have been making the best of a bad job.

Brown should be impeached. He has totally undermined the Nation's finances and forfeited all right to be a minister of the Crown.

mart

Kevyn, it's Saturday. Give the guys a break.

Damien Vaugh

I agree that gossip is no substitute for hard facts and anaylsis. This is possibly one of the most challanging economic crisis since the Wall Street crash and subsequent depression only this time the effects are global.

The most dissappointing aspect is that after all this time in opposition the Cameroon's have no policies. It is simply not good enough to attempt to blame Brown for the turmoil in the fanancial markets around the world that is now leeking into the main economy.

I am reminded that Cameron was the special advisor to Normon Lamont. On Black Wednesday interest rates went up from 10% to 12% and finally 15% in one day. This resulted in the UK withdrawing from the ERM. Later anaylsis indicated that this was as a result of the Conservative policy of deregulation. Norman Lamont lost his seat subsequently in 97 but was later enobled. It seems that no matter how catastropic the mismanagement those at the top will always take care of each other.

Remember;

It's a recession when your neighbor loses his job; it's a depression when you lose yours.
Harry S. Truman

Rhoda Klapp

Concur. Who cares who thought of it? It will surely have unintended consquences, they need to be identified, and it was implemented in a very dodgy way. They didn't ask parliament, they DID ask Brussels.

oldtimer

Look deeper and you will find two other comments which are extremely revealing:

The first:
"It needed dramatic falls in the banks’ share prices to persuade many that there really was no alternative."
Remember Mr Peston`s market moving leak? Check the share price timeline against his remarks and join the dots.

The second:
"But just as exhausted officials, lawyers and politicians drifted off into the early hours of Sunday morning, a deal-breaking row broke out between two crucial advisers at 3am.

Merrill Lynch’s Matthew Greenberg, who was advising Lloyds, violently disagreed with Simon Robey at Morgan Stanley (for HBOS) over the interpretation of several key clauses of their merger deal. With less than five hours to go before the London markets opened Paul Myners, the City Minister, was faced with having to wake Mr Brown and Mr Darling to tell them a global humiliation was looming.

He decided to leave the pair to argue between themselves in a corridor. Finally at 6am — with the fate of the world’s financial system hanging in the balance — Mr Greenberg backed down."

So this is how the notorious Lloyds-TSB-HBOS deal was settled - in effect at the point of a financial gun to his head.

This merger idea and the way it is being bull dozed through is a national disgrace. It is high time some one in the media did a proper journalistic job for once and subjected it to forensic analysis - along with the rest of the so-called "rescue plan".

TGF UKIP

Old hat really James, the story originally appeared, giving Sands and his FD, Meddings, much greater credit, on the front page of Thursday's Business section of the Browngraph.

Tiberius

Interesting stuff, Oldtimer. If one does join the dots, should one presume to find a picture of a smiling Prime Minister?

I still hope Lloyds TSB walk away from this deal.

And with all this going on, one has to ask whether Crick been incarcerated. Or is he still chasing nannies?

Pete, Scotland

oldtimer, you are not the only one to be suspiscious about how this whole crisis kicked off.

The whole thing smacks too much like a socialist plot to nationalise the banks.

Hysteria

and today's quote from Darling in the DT - "You will see us switching our spending priorities to areas which make a difference."

WTF????