News and Opinion in Black and White

What the hell is the UK coming to. Gordon Brown & Alistair Darling back dating the cars that will be eligible for the increased road tax band is completely out of order. Its is wiping hundreds if not thousands of pounds of the values of peoples cars. Again, Labour supposedly the party to represent the working man is hitting the working man the hardest with this new law. This law will effect the poorest people, not those people that can afford to buy a new car evey year or every 3 years.

There is no 2 ways about it. They are taking thousands of pounds out of peoples personal wealth with this new law. Applying the law on new vehicles would not be a problem.

But changing the rules after people have already invested their cash, is, in our opinion, completely and utterly unfair. If the rises in road tax were gradual it would be a bit easier to swallow, but in some cases the road tax is doubling or more on some vehicles.

To put it in a metaphorical perspective. What would you do if your monthly line rental on your mobile phone doubled. You would go to another provider. But with road tax, the government has got us over a barrel. What happened to democracy, with the government running the country for the people.

I dont really undertsand what he talking about but it’s still very interesting

There are many more talks on TED so here is a link to their site

I have always disagreed with giving aid in the form of food or water to developing countires. Like it says in the bible, ‘Give a man a fish, he’ll eat for a day; teach a man to fish and he’ll eat for a lifetime’. Much better to teach people how to farm than to give them food.

Here is an interesting video I found on TED.com which gives a present day example of this theory.

..they are anti-car. Just when they are saying sensible things I agree with they come up with a statement like “we agree with the current price of fuel”. Lets see what the high price of fuel has on the economy and on peoples pockets.

Not enough land, what a load of bull. There are millions of acres of uncultivated land in Africa. With the proper support and with political stability there is no reason why Africa cannot be a world leader in the production of food, but of course political stability is essential for this to happen and that mean the price of valuable raw materials will increase. I know what my conscience can live with.

“The lack of liquidity in the money markets” Why? Because of the “US Sub Prime Mortagage Market” What does that mean? Banks have sold these mortgages as part of a security and if people can’t pay their mortagage then the security is effectively worthless, or, even worse, the bankers dont know what the securities are worth because they don’t know what it’s made of.

The problem now? The banks don’t want to buy any securities, and if the banks don’t want to buy then they can’t sell, hence the shortage of cash.

Why the problem with mortgages? Interest rates. People have arguably over borrowed and worse still at low interest rates. When the interest rates have risen the effect is multiplied. If more people that can’t repay their mortgages, the more securities that become worthless. And if the securities become worthless, then their value is taken off the banks balance sheet.

So what is the Bank of England trying to achieve by buying these securities? Well to give the banks more money so they can lend to other banks. I’m sorry, but why would the banks want to borrow money at the moment. The trend at the time of writing is for the banks to cut back their current lending. Why? Is it because they dont have the money to lend? Or is it because they need as much cash on their books as possible to cover any potential losses they might incur from the securities they are holding losing their value. Going by what the HBOS are doing at the moment ie raising cash, then banks obviously want as much cash on their books as possible.

So what effect is the 50billion pounds provided to the banks by the Bank of England going to have. Very little. This is the metaphorical rubber ring for a drowing man. They will keep this cash to protect them against the uncertainty of the future. Its NOT going to encourage them to lend. This money will get swallowed into the black hole that is securities. Not forgetting this 50billion is our money.

Whats the answer? The government has got to be tough and the banks have got to accept the good times with the bad. What does this mean? Well, for a start the financing by the Bank of England has got to stop. Is is artificially prolonging the life of vauless securities. People have got to be allowed to lose their homes. And if the situation gets too bad the government has got to step in. Step in??? How?? They have to FORCE the banks to renegotiate the mortgages they have with the customer and NOT reposses the house.

Not enough land, what a load of bull. There are millions of acres of uncultivated land in Africa. With the proper support and with political stability there is no reason why Africa cannot be a world leader in the production of food, but of course political stability is essential for this to happen and that mean the price of valuable raw materials will increase. I know what my conscience can live with.

The motorsport communtiy has been trying to get rid of Max for years. At the end of the day he treats the FIA as his own personal empire and if the members don’t like the way he runs things then the can find another empire. His latest scandal has just reinforced our view. Due to the extremely embarrasing nature of the latest news headlines he had no choice really, but he is not going to leave when he is told, he has set his own timetable and will leave when he his good and ready.

To quote Alistair Darling “the Bank of England is issuing government bonds in return for high quality mortgage securities”. If these securities are such high quality, why the hell do the banks need the Bank of England to bail them out for? If they are such high qualirty then why don’t other banks buy them. The answer is simple, the private banks haven’t got a clue what their mortgage securities are worth which has caused the whole credit problem, and second even if they did know what they were worth, there is absolutely no way they are going to sell the Bank of England the best securities. Absolutely no way. And that is the kind way of saying it, they will probably sell the Bank of England some fo the dodgiest securities.

Normally something like this wouldn’t bother me, but when incompetent people have got control over my money and start giving it too over stretched, over ambitious, multi billion pound banks because they haven’t got the back bone to say “no, its your mess sort it out” it really f****s me off.