Darling Alistair's Scotland

Who said: "XXXXXXXX is in a unique position, by virtue of its size and financial strength, to provide support to XXXXXXXXX, and we regard it as both responsible and commercially beneficial to undertake this transaction."? You could be mistaken if you think you’ve heard it before but for me it’s another example of this government’s sheer stupidity (or is it cupidity?). A failed building society has been rescued with taxpayer’s money, albeit they’ve cleverly wrapped it up as “support” to a beneficial takeover.

I’m not talking here about LloydsTSB and its taking over of HBOS (that’s Halifax Bank of Scotland). Nope I’m remarking on the latest wheeze from the Scottish gang; that of the support given to Nationwide Building Society in the takeover (read rescue) of the Dunfermline Building Society, which apparently suddenly discovered it had losses of £24milion! I can see this must have been a surprise in a company that “even in good times” only cleared £6million profit in any one year. The quote was Graham Beale, the Chief Executive of Nationwide Building Society.

To be clear, I’m sure the good folk of Dunfirmline and its surrounding parts are genuinely shocked, worried and indeed horrified at the thought of losing their homes, and indeed it would be churlish, under normal circumstances to wish them ill. However let’s look at these rescue deals geographically shall we?

Royal Bank of Scotland, now, this has been taken over by the taxpayer after having made the biggest loss in British corporate history. Then we have that LloydsTSB (now Lloyds Group) takeover of HBOS, brokered by Gordo who broke his own fiscal policy in order to make this happen. The link here of course is that HBOS is an acronym for Halifax Bank of Scotland. You might have spotted that too. And now we have the Dunfermline (which is in Scotland) Building Society. Of course we had Northern Rock, which is based in the English part of the United Kingdom so its rescue package at least could be seen to balance the argument, until you see in whose constituency the head office is located. Yep Jim Cousins, a labour MP.

I know I may be running the risk of being a Murray Walker here but I can’t help thinking that if the failed businesses were called “Bank of Surrey” or “Mansions R Us (Hampshire) Building Society” then the rescue deals would have been less forthcoming. However Gordon the Clown and his team know which side their bread is buttered, thus I recommend that every financial institute or business in the UK changes its registered name so the words “of Scotland” appear somewhere, thereby guaranteeing that every taxpayer in the UK underwrites the business.