Piss Boiler of the the Week

The Financial Services Compensation Scheme

"Ah", I hear you say. "That's fuck all to do with Euros!"

Wrong! A few days ago I got a letter through from a Building Society explaining the new limits for the Financial Services Compensation Scheme which - if you remember - guarantees the first £50,000 of your deposits in the event that your bank does a Northern Rock.

Well, that's all changing in the 1st January, 2011 because the Fourth Reich has decided that the limits of the scheme will, from that date, be €100,000.

"Hang on!" you say. "But the UK isn't in the Euro zone so why is it in Euros?"

The answer of course is that the high Fuhrer, Herman von Arsehole and Chancellor Murky say so and, as we know, EU law takes precedence over UK law. So now, if you want to know how much of your money is protected - well, it depends on the exchange rate.

And let's be honest, the way the Euro is going at the moment that could be anything...

Come on, Cleggeron. Get us the fuck of this shower of shit now. Britain has always been a trailblazer, so how about we are the first country to quit the EU?

It makes sense - which is more that this does!

Update + + + Common sense seems to have (sort of) prevailed and the FSA has decided that €100,000 will be called £85,000 until further notice!

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It costs HOW MUCH !?!

Yesterday I reported on the view from the Taverna and how things have shot up in price here recently. Today, in my final report from the Greek front, I want to reflect on pricing in general here in Paxos. It's certainly not how I remember things...

My last Greek holiday was in a little fishing village on Samos - so generally comparable to here. There were two little supermarkets, half a dozen tavernas and not a lot else. Prices didn't vary a lot. A few cents here and there was about it. But how things have changed....

On our first day we went to the local shop for the essentials in life - Ouzo, Metaxa and a sixpack of Mythos beer. The Ouzo cost me just under €10, Metaxa €17.34 and the beer about €6.50. Purely in the interests of consumer research you understand, I replenished my stocks a few days later in a different shop. The price difference was about €6 on the same items. This variation would have been unheard of in Greece a couple of years ago!

Ditto that other essential of life - wine! After all "a meal without wine is like a summer without sunshine." After my earlier comments on the weather, I guess you can see this one coming : you can't buy a bottle of wine for less about €9 and that's the local stuff! On Samos I could get one for about half that. But never mind. The house wine at Onions was quite decent and he told where to buy it. So, problem solved -1.5 Litres of drinkable red wine in a plastic bottle for €3.50. Job done!

But I digress: Costs in general here have rocketed. Petrol is at €1.75 per litre - so stop whingeing and £1.20 'cos you don't know how well off you are! A large sliced loaf is over €3, a frozen cheese pizza will set you back €6, a packet of plain biscuits €1.30 and mince is over €9 a kilo. Reflect on that next time you're pushing your trolley round Tesco's!

So everything that used to be cheap is now expensive. Partly because this is due to the VAT increase from 8% to 10% on food. But, of course, if you translate these euro prices back to sterling it looks even worse. No wonder tourists off to Turkey instead!

So what did my friendly Taverna owner think of the Greek bailout package? He doesn't think it will do much good. When I told him that Alistair Darling agreed to contribute 10 odd billion to the pot to support the Euro, he nearly pissed himself laughing.

"But why?" He said."Britain is not in the Euro! That's crazy!" I think that summed the situation up nicely.

Margaret Thatcher would have asked for her money back...

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The View from the Taverna

You can always tell a good place to eat. Walk into any town past all the quiet restaurants and join the queue for a table outside the one that's heaving!

We've had a number of excellent Greek meals at a Taverna in Lakka called Nionio's - or Onions as the Brits call it. It's been in business since 1945 and you can tell why. The food is excellent, the front man positively exudes charm and the prices are reasonable.

Anyway, enough of the plug. I got chatting to the guy who runs it. His English is a hell of a sight better than my Greek. So I asked him where the people were? He replied "They don't come this year." simple, but sussinct and to the point. "Why?", I persisted. "They don't got no money." Good point.

Digging a little deeper, I asked what he thought had gone wrong? "Is your government", he replied. "They take all your money. And the exchange rate," he continued, "it's no so good for you. But now you have new government, so we hope this will be a good thing."

I explained that we thought everything was a good thing compared to the dreaded Broon. He replied "Your man did not seem very bright to me." So there you have it in a nutshell...

We discussed the other Broon stuff - i.e. the Broon stuff Greece seemed to be in. He replied "Keep the pound. Worst thing we ever do is to join the Euro. Prices went up 300% overnight." I've never heard a figure that extreme before, but this is a small island off the beaten track, so who am I to argue?

(I discovered a few days later that the reason for this was that Greeks tended to think of a minimum price of 100 drachma and when the Euro was introduced the thought processes moved to a minimum price of €1. Hence the 300% increase!)

Onions is a great place to eat and the prices are keen, but you still won't eat dinner for two there for less than about €30. A few years ago you could eat well for about €20 - and the exchange rate was better.

On the bill I was handed there were two columns headed 8% and 18%. These reflect the VAT rates of food and others (specifically booze). The current rate is 10% and 21%. He explained to me that these receipts were recently printed and if he were to change them every time the VAT rate changed, it would cost a fortune in printing! The higher rate is to go up to 23% shortly...

It made me reflect on what could happen in the forthcoming emergency budget once the true extent of the mess Broon left the UK's finances in is finally revealed!

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