The Labour Government

We've got Guardiola said:
It is a regulatory failure indeed but it's also a failure of moral compass. These people brought the entire system down through their fraud and greed. That's where the regulatory problem exists because there is still no punishment nor deterrent to excessive risk taking. Didn't Jeremy Hunt propose to remove the limits on banker bonuses only last year?

I suggest you watch the movie The Big Short if you think this is purely about regulatory oversight, it's also about actual criminal behaviour too and just remember that not a single one of these criminals went to prison. Their fraud caused the largest financial crash in living memory and some of the largest corporate collapses in living memory.

All of those people are now sunning it on handsome pensions and slush funds spending the money that you trusted them to keep safe and therefore money that our government had to give them to keep them afloat when it was lost.

I wonder if you are in favour of strict regulation of the city and financial sector, even if that restrains their growth?
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It appears that your knowledge of the matter begins and ends with a a rather poor movie, although that still probably places you at an advantage to several others on here.

We have had extremely strict regulations placed upon the UK financial sector for close to 20 years, and this has undoubtedly restrained its growth. This is why Rachel Reeves is now proposing a reappraisal of ringfencing arrangements as part of her Leeds package of reforms, which I personally believe would be beneficial and it’s one area where I support her.

Ringfencing has proved extremely costly to implement, both in terms of capital requirements and managerial demands, as indeed has been the senior manager and certification regime. This is another area where the current government - a Labour government- is proposing a dilution of the rules.

Again, your suggestion that no deterrence exists to excessive risk taking simply doesn’t fit with the reality of the certification regime (are you even aware of its existence?), which places unusually high demands upon the behaviour both risk takers and the people they report to. It’s why many senior bankers typically seek to remove themselves of these managerial duties toward the end of their careers, or they simply choose to retire early, given the prospect of potentially severe sanctions being placed on them when they retire.

The bonus cap you referenced is one component of this certification regime, at least for material risk takers (MRT), and offers a clear example of accountability in relation to excessive risks or poor behaviour. The lifting of the cap for non-MRTs is not designed to increase renumeration overall, but rather to reduce the fixed costs for banks in the UK and reduce the disadvantage these banks face in relation to foreign competitors.

Similarly your claim that no one has gone to jail is misplaced, and you might want to look into how Tom Hayes in particular has been treated. I think his experiences challenge a good number of the points you make, but I hope you find the above useful nonetheless.
 
johnny crossan said:
Front benchers cheering on Keir waving union jacks and St George crosses - if they are deconstructing what about the Welsh Dragons & the Saltire?

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Indeed.

Some PR wonk needs a fucking kicking.

"Let's show how positively patriotic we are by shagging a flag."
 
I'm not bothered about flags.

I'm bothered about making sure I can pay my bills and be able to have some money left to spend or invest.

The majority of this working public are struggling to live from one pay packet to the next.

How does the 'party of the workers' try to improve our lot? They don't. They just want to play who's the biggest flagshaggers with Farage and his fascists.
 
johnny crossan said:
Front benchers cheering on Keir waving union jacks and St George crosses - if they are deconstructing what about the Welsh Dragons & the Saltire?

View attachment 171012
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They do at least show diversity. Meanwhile Starmer is shitting himself because the great British public have had enough of people ignoring our boundaries.
 
Took about 25 minutes before he started to speak with a bit of fire and passion. A good couple of minutes of impassioned oratory from him. Then he lost the moment and went back to talking about his Dad being a tool maker.
 
TinFoilHat said:
Indeed.

Some PR wonk needs a fucking kicking.

"Let's show how positively patriotic we are by shagging a flag."
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Any party who puts the flag(s) as a prominent part of their iconography will get more votes. It’s a gimmick, yes, but it proper fucking works.

Labour did it as part of the last GE after a good decade or so without it being seen. They also did it with Blair back in 1997:

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People love the Union Flag, it’s cool as fuck:

IMG_2586.jpeg

IMG_2588.jpeg

IMG_2587.jpeg

It’s Mods, it’s Britpop, Cool Britannia, it’s sport… even if you think it’s a gimmick, it is patriotic (which is a good thing) and it does work.
 
.db. said:
Any party who puts the flag(s) as a prominent part of their iconography will get more votes. It’s a gimmick, yes, but it proper fucking works.

Labour did it as part of the last GE after a good decade or so without it being seen. They also did it with Blair back in 1997:

View attachment 171014

People love the Union Flag, it’s cool as fuck:

View attachment 171015

View attachment 171016

View attachment 171017

It’s Mods, it’s Britpop, Cool Britannia, it’s sport… even if you think it’s a gimmick, it is patriotic (which is a good thing) and it does work.
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They were waving the flag of England.

The government of the day said fuck you to every other nation.
 
TinFoilHat said:
They were waving the flag of England.

The government of the day said fuck you to every other nation.
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I don’t tink anyone in the picture you posted was from Wales or Scotland so why would they wave those flags if they aren’t from there? I’m sure I saw some being waved around other parts of the room.
 
We've got Guardiola said:
It is a regulatory failure indeed but it's also a failure of moral compass. These people brought the entire system down through their fraud and greed. That's where the regulatory problem exists because there is still no punishment nor deterrent to excessive risk taking. Didn't Jeremy Hunt propose to remove the limits on banker bonuses only last year?

I suggest you watch the movie The Big Short if you think this is purely about regulatory oversight, it's also about actual criminal behaviour too and just remember that not a single one of these criminals went to prison. Their fraud caused the largest financial crash in living memory and some of the largest corporate collapses in living memory.

All of those people are now sunning it on handsome pensions and slush funds spending the money that you trusted them to keep safe and therefore money that our government had to give them to keep them afloat when it was lost.

I wonder if you are in favour of strict regulation of the city and financial sector, even if that restrains their growth?
Click to expand...
I've seen that film but a long time ago now. But I don't remember the key players doing anything illegal. Immoral perhaps, but illegal? Wasn't it merely that they were betting on a market crash and had an enormous short position, and were holding out waiting for it to happen? Unless I have forgotten a key element and there was something more underhand being done? The irresponsible lending which made a crash ultimately inevitable is of course a separate thing, but that wasn't the subject of the film, as I recall.

Trading with long or short positions is not illegal, in fact it's a key pillar of the entire financial system.
 
Chippy_boy said:
I've seen that film but a long time ago now. But I don't remember the key players doing anything illegal. Immoral perhaps, but illegal? Wasn't it merely that they were betting on a market crash and had an enormous short position, and were holding out waiting for it to happen? Unless I have forgotten a key element and there was something more underhand being done? The irresponsible lending which made a crash ultimately inevitable is of course a separate thing, but that wasn't the subject of the film, as I recall.

Trading with long or short positions is not illegal, in fact it's a key pillar of the entire financial system.
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What was happening could argued to be illegal and certainly from a fraud perspective because the people involved were at least defrauding each other and the system itself for the sake of their commissions and bonuses. At best it's incompetence alongside greed but it could very easily be argued as wilful fraud and/or negligence.

They first lent money that they shouldn't and they packaged debts that they knew that were crap hidden amongst debts that were okay. The credit reference agencies rated them as bullet proof because they were based upon housing and they wanted the business. As a result various other banks bought up these packages, they never looked at what was in them and the circus went on and on.

The thing that actually took RBS down was Fred the Shred wanted to expand RBS and so he bought into ABN Amro. They failed to do proper due diligence (housing never fails apparently) and ABN Amro had a shit ton of these crappy debts which ended up on the RBS balance sheet. All of the dominoes fell, RBS ran out of money and their corporate losses exceeded £25bn in 2008 and the taxpayer had to bail them out.

Would you expect criminal investigations, regulatory change and blah blah? No, nobody went to prison, some didn't even lose their jobs and post-2008 RBS bosses were given billions in bonuses and Fred the Shred himself is now living it up on a £600k per year pension!
 
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