Banking on Essex to Close
posted 24th February, 2011
At the beginning of this year, our newsletter and website posed the question whether Lord Hanningfield's Bank should be considered bankrupt.
This announcement, by his successor as Leader of Essex County Council, confirms the foresight in that article. The problem is that we see yet another gimmick, created with great fanfare and ending at great expense (and with no apology) to rate-payers.
The global and UK banking crises came about not only because of the greed and arrogance of the bankers, but also because of the ineptitude of the politicians and officials who were meant to be supervising them.
In September 2009, the local press reported that Essex County Council threw more rate-payers' money at the problem.
Councillors voted yesterday to spend a further £200,000 on the bank, in addition to its £250,000 start-up costs. The details emerged as its executive scrutiny committee questioned a decision to fund research on extending the scheme to create a municipal Bank of Essex.
Sarah Candy, councillor responsible for finance, said the extra £200,000 was “to make sure it is the appropriate way to manage risk”.
Based on that, many people might have thought that if there was one group of people less suited to run banks than bankers, it would be politicians and civil servants.
They can be certain of that now.
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