Bank greed is the real scandal of our times

June 29th, 2012

FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda

By
Daily Mail Comment

PUBLISHED:

17:07 EST, 28 June 2012

|

UPDATED:

17:07 EST, 28 June 2012

Almost four years have passed since the rapacious greed of the bankers, pursuing profit at any cost, left the Western world’s financial system trembling on the brink.

Yet, scandalously, in Britain no public inquiry has ever been held into an economic meltdown which required a desperate £1trillion bailout for the banks and triggered a vicious recession which, according to the Governor of the Bank of England, will be with us for years.

Contrast this with America, where a merciless inquiry commission forensically examined their banking debacle, exposing the guilty men.

Scandal: Why has there been no investigation into the actions of Barclays and other banks?

Scandal: Why has there been no investigation into the actions of Barclays and other UK banks?

In Britain, the authorities have barely scratched the surface in exposing the amoral, reckless and corrupt behaviour in which our banks were engaged.

Why, for example, are we only this week discovering – largely courtesy of the US authorities – details of how Barclays systematically and illegally manipulated key interest rates which lie at the heart of the financial system from 2005 onwards?

Truly, it’s impossible to overstate how serious this scandal is.

Pressure: Barclay's CEO Bob Diamond must be held to account

Pressure: Barclay’s CEO Bob Diamond must be held to account

Barclays colluded in artificially increasing or lowering the interest charged by banks when they lend money to one another – a rate which determines the cost of millions of financial products, including mortgages and the loans made to small businesses.

They were lying to and cheating the public on a monumental scale in order to make money, in the first instance, and then to trick the authorities into thinking the bank was in a healthier state than was actually the case.

The senior staff involved have many disturbing questions to answer. But it is the bank’s chief executive Bob Diamond, in charge of the section responsible, who must be truly held to account.

Mr Diamond’s decision to forego part of his bonus, in light of the £290million fine levied on Barclays on Wednesday by regulators, looks a pathetic gesture, given the riches he amassed during the years when his bank was behaving so recklessly.

It’s barely believable that, in November last year, he had the front to deliver a BBC lecture in which he promised bankers would be ‘good citizens’, while knowing Barclays was on the verge of being exposed for having rigged the financial markets for five years!

What is abundantly clear, though, is that Barclays was only one of many guilty banks – with up to 20 institutions, spread over three continents, including Lloyds, RBS and HSBC, now being dragged into an ever deepening mess.

By the time the probe is completed, hundreds of bankers are likely to have been implicated.

The evidence must be rigorously pursued by the police and the Serious Fraud Office and, if evidence of criminal behaviour exists, the law must be allowed to take its course.

Most important of all, however, is the need for the Prime Minister to order – at long last – a judge-led public inquiry into every detail of the financial crash.

While the Leveson inquiry (set up by Mr Cameron) into media ethics grinds on, the country remains in the dark over the real scandal of recent years, which continues to inflict misery and hardship on millions of ordinary people.

Model: The banking sector should be subject to the same scrutiny to which the media have been subjected by the Leveson inquiry

The feeble investigations carried out by MPs – who lack the power to obtain key documents – and the Financial Services Authority have failed to identify the guilty men properly.

And who knows what other criminally irresponsible acts remain hidden from public view?

Until they are exposed, lessons cannot be learned. And public mistrust will continue to eat away at the banking system like a cancer.

Here’s what other readers have said. Why not add your thoughts,
or debate this issue live on our message boards.

The comments below have not been moderated.

Newest
Oldest
Best rated
Worst rated

Who on earth is surprised by this ? It is exactly the same market rigging that spewed all these fraudulently priced mortgage backed securities onto the market and caused the current financial crisis. High crimes indeed. Why haven’t these ‘Masters of the Universe’ been brought to book under the RICO statutes in the US and had their assets confiscated ? It would truly be justice if Blankfein and Bob Diamond were reduced to panhandling on Wall Street instead of whooshing past the rest of us (pond life) in their corporate limousines ?

– Tony , Worthing , 29/6/2012 04:05

No, Trudi. How do you distinguish between people who borrowed within what were their means and then lost their incomes owing to the credit crunch and those who borrowed recklessly? It’s a chicken and egg question. What came first? It was financial products devised by the banks – both for sale to the public and to other banks and financial institutions. At some point, these products became toxic and that wasn’t the fault of Joe Public, but of the institutions devising and hawking junk.

– teresa, london, 29/6/2012 03:34

The US is doing the job that the UK has failed to do: Inquiring, investigating and prosecuting. There is no other way.

– Lionheart, Utopia, 29/6/2012 03:25

What money is it that these nefarious geezers are awarding themselves? All they did was set up a stall and ask the man in the street: Do you want some money, Mister? If Mr Public had said No, young Sir! I cannot spend what I do not have! Don’t be so damned irresponsible! The bankers would now be no more puffed up than Captain Mainwaring. It was only because Mr Public said ‘how much can I take’? and then took even more, that the banking sector lost all sense of? All sense! Until Mr Public accepts his part in what’s gone on, nothing, but nothing, will change.

– Trudi, Worcs, 29/6/2012 01:05

The views expressed in the contents above are those of our users and do not necessarily reflect the views of MailOnline.