{"id":6115,"date":"2015-10-05T16:14:43","date_gmt":"2015-10-05T15:14:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/unitelive.org\/?p=6115"},"modified":"2015-10-05T16:14:43","modified_gmt":"2015-10-05T15:14:43","slug":"dont-tell-george","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/?p=6115","title":{"rendered":"Don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t tell George"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Chancellor George Osborne spoke today (October 5) at the Tory Party Conference, just hours after it was announced that the government will continue with its sell-off of its remaining 12 per cent stake in Lloyds Bank, offering discounted shares to the public next spring.<\/p>\n

 
\nProudly hailing it the \u00e2\u20ac\u015bbiggest privatisation in 20 years\u00e2\u20ac\u0165, Osborne said that all money earned from the shares will be used to pay off the national debt.<\/p>\n

 
\nHowever, despite the government having sold off most of its stake gradually since December of last year, it still remains more than \u00c2\u01415bn short in recouping the \u00c2\u014120.5bn taxpayer-funded bailout the bank received during the financial crisis in 2008.<\/p>\n

 
\nIn the latest sell-off Osborne has proposed, ordinary investors who buy less than \u00c2\u01411,000 in shares \u00e2\u20ac\u201c as opposed to large institutional investors \u00e2\u20ac\u201c will be given priority. These investors will receive a 5 per cent discount on shares, as well as a loyalty bonus if they hold onto their shares for longer than a year.<\/p>\n

 
\nIt\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a crowd-pleasing, populist idea \u00e2\u20ac\u201c reminiscent of the Thatcher-era \u00e2\u20ac\u0098Tell Sid\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 ad campaign \u00e2\u20ac\u201c and drew cheers from the delegates at the Tory conference today. But the BBC\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s policy editor Chris Cook highlighted the dangers of such a scheme earlier this year<\/a>.<\/p>\n

 
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bBank equity is a super-complex financial product,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 he noted. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bModern banks trade in things that are impossibly difficult to follow from the outside.<\/p>\n

 
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bLloyds Banking Group is not British Telecom,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 he added. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bThat all makes scrutiny by shareholders both harder and more important. Retail investors, with only small stakes in the company, may not be able to put the time into it. It might not pay for them to bother.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 
\nUltimately, Cook argued, being owned by many small shareholders essentially incentivises the bank to serve management \u00e2\u20ac\u201c at the expense of customers and staff \u00e2\u20ac\u201c and encourages the same recklessness that sparked the financial crisis seven years ago.<\/p>\n

 
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThat might not just mean mega-bonuses, which are easy to spot, nor simply unjustifiably high pay,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 he said. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bThe bank could be very badly run. And the shareholders might only find out when it all gets too late.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 
\nIt\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a point that Unite has long made in its support of the government retaining a controlling share in the banks it bailed out \u00e2\u20ac\u201c it provides the opportunity to reform an industry that caused the financial collapse in the first place.<\/p>\n

 
\nBack to the 80s<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

 
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bOsborne is dusting off another plan straight out of the 80s,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 said Unite national officer for finance Rob MacGregor in response to today\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s news. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bBut this fire sale is driven by Tory ideology, not what is best for the bank, its staff or the public who rely on it.<\/p>\n

 
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bWith both Lloyds and RBS, rather than rushing to sell the taxpayer’s stake in the banking sector at a loss, the government should use these shares to bring scrutiny and transparency to boardrooms across the industry,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 he added. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bOsborne should focus on the long-term health of Britain’s banks to ensure the industry works for the good of the public who bailed it out.”<\/p>\n

 
\nJust days before Osborne announcing its sale of the latest tranche of Lloyds shares, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA)<\/a> announced that those who were mis-sold payment protection insurance policies (PPI) now face a deadline for making claims.<\/p>\n

 
\nLloyds was by far the worst offender in the PPI scandal \u00e2\u20ac\u201c it has half of the entire industry\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s \u00c2\u014126bn PPI bill.<\/p>\n

 
\nThis, MacGregor noted, shows just why it is so important that banks are under continued scrutiny.
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bWithout proper scrutiny, how can we be sure it won’t happen again?\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 
\nUnite, too, has supported the so-called Robin Hood Tax<\/a> as another means of encouraging banking reform. As a tax on those trading in financial products such as stocks, bonds and commodities, it has the potential to raise more than \u00c2\u014120bn each year and it discourages the risk-taking behaviour that precipitated the financial collapse.<\/p>\n

 
\nIt\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a tax policy that shadow chancellor John McDonnell came out in favour of at a Unite-sponsored fringe meeting at the Labour Party Conference last week.<\/p>\n

 
\nThe panel was chaired by Unite assistant general secretary Gail Cartmail, who argued that making the 1 per cent of the financial sector pay their way must not threaten jobs.<\/p>\n

 
\nAnd it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s yet another reason that the government retaining a controlling share in the banks is so crucial \u00e2\u20ac\u201c it would stop the industry from handing down the taxes imposed on them to their workforce, who\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve faced massive job losses and cuts to pay and conditions as a result of the bank levy.<\/p>\n

 
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bAcross the banking sector Unite members are organising and articulating a powerful collective voice to demand change,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 Cartmail noted in a recent editorial in support of the Robin Hood Tax<\/a>. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bIt is a voice that demands an end to the assault on pay, terms, conditions and pensions. It is a voice that holds senior figures accountable for their actions and brings transparency to the boardrooms.<\/p>\n

 
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bMost importantly, it is a voice which recognises that being a good employer goes hand in hand with social responsibility,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 she said. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bThis collective voice demands that bank executives pay what they owe, both to the workforce and to the public.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Chancellor George Osborne spoke today (October 5) at the Tory Party Conference, just hours after it was announced that the government will continue with its sell-off of its remaining 12 per cent stake in Lloyds Bank, offering discounted shares to the public next spring.   Proudly hailing it the \u00e2\u20ac\u015bbiggest privatisation in 20 years\u00e2\u20ac\u0165, Osborne […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6119,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[17],"tags":[292,141,178],"wps_subtitle":"Lloyds sell off is 80s privatisation-style ","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6115"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6115"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6115\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6120,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6115\/revisions\/6120"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6119"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}