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Showing posts with label economy. Show all posts

New Balls

He's at it again! It really is time that the Milipede put the muzzle on his Rotweiller, especially if he is going to sink as low as this...

Yesterday, Balls decided that the best way to attack the Chancellor ahead of next week's budget was to play the Japan card. This what he said :

It won't be good enough if George Osborne stands up next week in the Budget and says the reason he has to downgrade his growth forecast is the cold winter, or the Irish bailout or because of the spike in world oil prices or the aftermath of the Japanese earthquake.

Frankly Ed, this is bad taste even for you.

Balls has a reputation for putting his foot in his mouth pretty much every time he opens it. His comments have been called 'insensitive' and 'insulting to the Japanese people'. It's hard to disagree.

Tory MP Aidan Burley summed it up nicely : "It seems very distasteful to be pre-empting a comment George has not made and almost certainly won't make. It must be a new low for a shadow Chancellor to think the Chancellor would blame an 8.8 earthquake in Japan as in some way responsible for a decade of Labour mismanagement of the economy."

Labour of course said they had made a fair point about not been distracted by external events and that Balls had said 'nothing wrong'. The Milipede has kept a low profile on the matter. Frankly appointing this man as his Shadow Chancellor hardly shows good judgement...

Osbourne's petrol U-turn

Incredible as it my seem, the Mighty Milipede's mouthpieces are accusing chancellor George Osbourne of doing a U-turn on petrol duty!

Their bleet relates to the Consevative promise to introduce a fuel price stabiliser mechanism in their election manifesto. They accuse the government of going back on this promise.

The price of petrol has hit £1.35 a litre due to the price of crude and the increases in VAT to 20% so Osbourne - as far as I can see in an effort to keep his promise - is considering reversing Alistair Darling's increase of 1p per litre due to come in in April.

It will come as no surprise to you to know that the Milipede is not anxious to describe this 1p change as a U-turn!

The scrapping of Labour's post dated tax rise is seem as an opportunity to be shown willing to find a working system and to allow time for the mechanics of that system to be ironed out. Business Secretary Vince Cable told reporters at Westminster that while a fuel stabiliser ‘could be made to work’ it would be difficult, ‘because what is the price around which you set the ups and downs (of the oil price)?’ He added: ‘There are real technical difficulties in operating such a system.’

Mr Osborne is determined to use his Budget on March 23 to respond to public disquiet about petrol prices.

For Labour, shadow transport secretary Maria Eagle said: "The Conservative-led government is all over the place on fuel prices. Each week ministers raise expectations of action but they've still done nothing. Warm words from George Osborne about a 1p change on fuel duty are all well and good, but families are paying 3p a litre more at the pump because of the VAT rise he chose to bring in."

Here at least is one senior Labour figure who fails to remember that it is Labour's 1p it is proposed to scrap and that Labour intended to raise VAT to 19%.

People who live in glass houses, really shouldn't throw stones...

New Balls!

"iTalk" has been at it again - a full blown attack on George Osbourne in the Daily Mirror. Let's look at what he had to say :

What matters most when times are hard is whether the government is trying to shield you from the storm, or leaving you to fend for yourself.

When Osborne or his Lib Dem lackeys say: “It’s all Labour’s fault, we inherited a mess” .... what they’re really saying to the British people is: “We’re not responsible: don’t ask us for help.”

Well, that's all very well, Binky, and it makes a nice soundbite. Where was your government when the shit was hitting the fan? Oh, out spending money we hadn't got because you emptied the coffers. You created this mess. You were responsible or we would not have the scale of problems we have, so to accuse the coalition of not trying to sort it shows a distinct lack of grip on reality.

And "LibDem lackeys"? That's just downright insulting. Name calling is the last resort of an immature mind.

The Tories say that because Labour was not tough enough in regulating the banks, the economic crisis is our fault.

They forget that every time the Labour government tried to tighten regulation, it was the Tories who protested we were strangling enterprise with red tape, and David Cameron who accused Gordon Brown of being The Great Regulator.

There goes that grip on reality again. Labour destroyed regulation of the banks. Balls himself was the very man calling for a 'light touch' in dealing with financial regulation. The regulation Labour tried to tighten was on small and medium size business who were destroyed by a sea of red tape. It was this red tape that Cameron was referring to, not the banks. Labour let the banks get away with murder. In fact, the first thing Tony Blair did when he left office was to join the board of a merchant bank.

The Tories want you to believe Labour spent too much money on services like schools, hospitals and the police, and that is why we have today’s budget deficit.
That way they can justify drastic cuts in those services in order to bring down the deficit, and say it is all Labour’s fault.

If you define 'too much' as money we don't actually have, then that's exactly what Labour did. Cutting spending and raising taxes is the only way to reduce a structural deficit.

Cameron has been forced to match some of Labour's spending plans in some areas because this is a COALITION, Ed. The LibDem 'lackeys' do actually have some say and are actually more left wing than the Conservatives. It's called prioritisation and compromise, something you seem to know little about.

When the financial crisis hit, we were badly affected by the loss of tax revenues from the City, and we had to inject huge sums of money to protect people’s mortgages and savings and stop the British banking system from collapsing.

On top of that, we cut VAT for a year, introduced the car scrappage scheme, funded apprenticeships and job creation schemes, and subsidised mortgages – all to stop people losing their jobs, homes and businesses.

That is what caused the deficit, not spending on schools, hospitals and the police.

You didn't regulate the banks properly, then you had to bail them out. The money you threw at the economy was to buy votes. Spending actually did make the deficit worse. That's not even economics - it's called basic housekeeping.

Every time they take an unpopular decision, the Tories say the same thing: it’s not our fault, we inherited a mess.

In reality, they inherited an economy which was beginning to recover strongly, with unemployment falling, interest rates at historic lows, and the public finances better than the Treasury’s forecasts

Actually, the Coalition say that we need to sort it out. The economy was recovering, but not strongly and interest rates at historic lows has crippled the very people who have the disposable income to boost the economy - people living on their investments. It has also helped inflation to rise. It appears we learnt nothing from the Japanese experience of punitively low interest rates.

And just because the public finances outperform the Treasury forecasts doesn't necessarily mean that they are performing well, does it?

The Labour Party has a responsibility to stand up for millions of Mirror readers across the country who are already being hit by rising unemployment, rising inflation and the rise in VAT.

Bank lending has strangled investment and caused job losses. That includes the banks you bought and then failed to control. Low interest rates and taxes introduced by you have cause infation to rise, coupled with the false readings in the figures when VAT went back to 17.5% - and let's not forget that you were intending to raise it to 19%. Oh, and then there's those fuel tax rises you introduced. They had no effect on inflation, did they?

You can read his full article by clicking here, but in the words of the song "You say it best when you say nothing at all"...

Forest Chumps

Back in October, the government announced rather ill concieved plans to sell off vast tracts of forest under it's plans to 'substantially reform' the Forestry Commission.

This is a bloody silly idea because - as was discovered when the Scottish parliament came up with a similar plan - you might raise some capital initially but this all leaks back to the new owners. What is effectively happening is that the new owners have the right to chop down all the trees and profit from the timber whist at the same time having access to public funding in order to plant new ones! In fact we are likely to dish out more money to the new landowners than would ever be raised from the sales.

Just to prove the point, the Forestry Commission does occasionally sell off land. One such sale resulted in proceeds of £60,000. The new owner immediately applied for money under the English Woodlands Grant Scheme and was awarded £55,000 to plant new trees. And, of course, he can apply for further grants in the future...

The Forestry Commission is, in fact, a bargain. Last year it raised £75m from the sale of timber, thus costing the taxpayer a net £15m to provide miriad essential services such as tree sciences (e.g. research into potentially devasting diseases like Dutch Elm and Royal Oak), and regulation and licensing of the private forestry sector.

This idea was not thought through properly in the rush to cut the waste out of quangos, and makes no economic sense. It should be scrapped immediately.

Absolute Balls

Frankly, it beggars belief that the Mighty Milipede should appoint as Shadow Chancellor the very man who, under Gordon Brown at the Treasury, played such a major part in the economic woes currently bestting this country.

Ed Balls is a disaster waiting to happen. But does this matter to the Milipede? No, not at all it seems. The Labour Party is already hailing this appointment as a return to the combatative politics they long for after being crushed at the last election.

The fact is that the Milipede has no policies - at least none he is prepared to admit to. So far - and I may be proved wrong - his strategy seems to be to take the party back to the bad old days before 'New' Labour. This is, of course, what his masters at the TUC want from him - a return to power for a Union movement which has been losing control ever since the days of Thatcher and the miners' strike.

So where does Balls fit in?

Balls is a bruiser in some ways reminiscent of John Prescott but with a little more grooming. He's quite happy to get stuck in and likely relishes the idea of having a go at George Osbourne. The problem is he lacks depth when it comes to economic policy - amply proved by his contribution in the last government - and he's not a particularly eloquent speaker.

If he was an Apple product, he would likely be known as 'iTalk' Balls.

And the Milipede needs to remember one thing about Balls - Rotweillers have been known to bite their masters as well...

Red Ed can't make his mind up

Last Saturday, Ed Miliband made a major speech to the Fabian Society which warrants close scrutiny not least of all for what it tells us about the man himself.

It seems that the trouble with the Mighty Milipede could be that he simply can't make his mind up...

Having accused the Conservatives of making no effort in the Oldham East by-election on order to favour the LibDems, he went on in his speech to say that "David Cameron became the first Prime Minister in recent years to campaign in a by-election." Sounds a little contradictory to me, Ed...

Then he went on to call for Labour to show "a willingness to reach out to others beyond our party at the heart of the way we do our politics" having just slagged off the Conservatives and LibDems as a "coalition based on political convenience rather than values." Seems to me like you calling on your own party to do exactly what you are condemning.

And then there is his comment that Labour's "managerialism took us away from the instincts and values of the broad progressive majority" whilst at the same time attacking the coalition government for decentralising decision making.

"Of course I am proud of the achievements of our last Labour government" he goes on to say, but then again admits they were guilty of "failing to properly regulate the banks, ignoring concerns about economic security".

Mr Miliband says of the country's woes "it was the crisis that caused high levels of public borrowing" but then goes on to say "our economy was too vulnerable to the crisis because we were too reliant on financial services", the very financial services that Gordon Brown as Chancellor and later as Prime Minister derugulated!

But for me the best statement in his speech was when he said : "when we you see some of our leading bankers constantly threatening to leave the country, trying to hold the country to ransom and thinking only of themselves, it makes me angry."

Well I'm sorry Ed, but when I see rampant left wing socialists manipulating the trades union movement in order to try to bring down a democratically elected government and, what's more, to use your words "trying to hold the country to ransom and thinking only of themselves", then it makes me absolutely bloody furious!

And the word 'hypocrite' springs readily to mind...

"Vat's the way to do it.."

I have become very angry over the last 24 hours listening to the absolute bollocks that has been peddled by TV news (ITV and BBC for a change) about yesterday's increase in VAT.

Let's look at some of the quotes that have been shown in interviews with politicians and on the street vox pops :

"My business will suffer because the increase in VAT will leave people with less disposable income" - absolute bollocks. It will have no effect whatsoever on disposable income as it is a tax on spending not income. Nice scaremongering though.

"I'm worried about the increase in food prices." This from a student. As there is no VAT on food, the only reason I can think of for believing this - apart from the fact that he may possibly be a brian washed leftie that believes Milipede propaganda - is that a student's version of food comes across the bar or in takeaway wrappers. That's not real food, mate, so it doesn't count. Learn to cook!

"We're no going to be able to go out down the pub with our mates or eat out when we want. It's not fair!" I think that just about sums up the out of touch with reality element in this country.

"A family on £25,000 a year is going to be £396 a year worse off." Now what the fuck do you base that on? Needless to say the calculation is not explained. As VAT is on spending not income, exactly how are we able to make this comparison? Lies, damn lies and statistics...

"It hits the poorest families more than the rich." More bollocks. It's nonsensical to look at the effect on earnings as it is a tax on spending. If I earn a million quid a year and spend sod all, then there is no VAT. Ditto if I earn fifteen grand. More accurately, you should look at the effect on spending power and not income. When you do this, it actually hits the richest worst.

"Comsumer groups warn that businesses will put up prices by between 5 and 8 per cent not just the 2.5% VAT element." Well for a start the actual increase is less than 2.5% because it's on the NET figure not the figure that already includes tax. Furthermore, if this is the case, it is called PROFITEERING and that is fuck all to do with the VAT increase - it's just opportunistic greed!

Miliband says it is the wrong tax at the wrong time. He refuses at all junctures to answer the question "What would you do instead?" This is because the only viable alternative is National Insurance - and that really does hit the poorest worst because it hits their wage packets and employers' wages bills.

He also conveniently forgets that the last Labour government tried to raise VAT twice but the move was blocked by Gordon Brown. And the perpetrator of the idea was - er - Ed Miliband.

One word of common sense came from a pensioner : "We've all got to pull our horns in 'cos we've got no money. Labour spent it all. Anyway, we've managed before and we'll do it again"

That last one was on the local news. I'll bet it doesn't make the nationals...

Get real, Rowan...

Will no-one rid us of this turbulent priest?

I am well known for my views on organised religion and the Catholic Church in particular, but when I reviewed the patronising and out of touch remarks made the Archpisspot of Cunterbury in his Christmas sermon, then the words of Henry II just seemed to come echoing back to me!

So, in the interests of evening things up with the Kafliks, lets take a look at what the man in the teacloth had to say for himself :

"Faced with the hardship that quite clearly lies ahead for so many in the wake of financial crisis and public spending cuts, how far are we able to sustain a living sense of loyalty to each other, a real willingness to bear the load together?" Do what, Rowan? Exactly how much are you and your church contributing?

"We can and will as a society bear hardship if we are confident that it is being fairly shared." OK, Rowan, I'll give that one, but then you go on to say "...no interest group or pressure group is able to opt out" - well. apart from the Church of England that is.

"God, it seems, knows that whatever limitation and humiliation our human freedom lays on him, we cannot live without him; and he accepts everything for the sake of our well-being." So exactly what exactly is He doing for us - and incidentally Rowan I notice that on your website you have demoted the Allmighty to lower case 'he' which I would have thought was a little disrespectful? He is accepting what and doing what for us exactly? Please do tell, because I see no sign of it.

And please don't lecture me about how the rich need to contribute more than the poor. I have always maintained that incremental taxation already achieves this. If I earn £30,000 I pay 20% tax on it so why should I pay 40% if I earn £60,000? Why should I pay four times as much for earning twice as much. It is already grossly unfair and I don't need some guy who has a grace and favour palace in Lambeth and pays next to fuck all tax to lecture me on this subject!

And what about overseas, Rowan? Well "I remind you of our Zimbabwean friends, still suffering harassment, beatings and arrests, legal pressures and lockouts from their churches." Er, excuse me but I see you used the word 'legal' there. It's not up to you to tell other countries - or indeed our country - to go against what is legal.

And then to make it worse, you continue "Our prayers continue for Asia Bibi in Pakistan and others from minority groups who suffer from the abuse of the law." Seems you don't like the law very much do you?

How about Iraq? "It is a great grace that both Christians and Muslims in this country have joined in expressing their solidarity with this beleaguered minority." What you should be doing, Rowan, is keeping your nose out of other peoples' countries.

Henry II dealt harsely with a former Archbishop when he stuck his unwelcome nose into politics. I sincerely suggest that you need to stick to things spiritual and when I comes to politics, remember that it is not your place to comment...

Death of the T-Shirt Trade

I have mixed views about tourism. It has undoubtedly fucked up the world big time and yet I would be hypocrite if, as a seasoned traveller, I denied but I am not in any way to blame.

On my recent trip around the Pacific, I have seen first-hand the way that tourism can completely ruin some of the most beautiful and exotic locations. But the damage appears to me not just be due to the almost total economic dependence on tourism, but - especiallly in the post credit crunch era - it is due to what happens when the tourists stopped coming.

Eventually it was bound to happen anyway as over commercialism took away the very features that attracted the visitors in the first place. But when you combine that with worldwide austerity, the process is disastrously accelerated.

Bora Bora conjures up the immediate image of the perfect romantic location. Like most of Polynesia, it has become hugely dependent on tourists. When they stop coming, the economic decline is immediate - hotels close, unemployment rises rapidly, shops have no customers.

The double whammy is of course that there are no other local industries to take the place of tourism because all has all been set aside in pursuit of the quick and easy buck.

If these places are to survive then, ironically, they need to return to the very images of life in paradise that they are trying to peddle, otherwise they have no future.

And, if I'm honest, it is largely their own fault...

The Snot Gobblers Guide to the Galaxy

This is a first for this blog. I couldn't have put this better myself, so I'm not going to try

What follows is an excellent review of Gordon Brown's new book by Supertzar.

When you read Tony Blair's response to the coalition's plans, when you consider the ideas Frank Field had to transform welfare in Britain, when you look at the spectacular growth in ultimately ineffective tick-box City compliance, when you consider the £6bn the UK Exchequer lost from selling the country's gold reserves or the decimation of private sector pensions, when you consider which country alone had a run on its banks or look at the level of indebtedness and structural defecit in the UK, you begin to notice a thread.

It's quite clear that the country has paid a high price for the grandiose delusions of Gordon Brown. Whether delaying welfare reform, jacking up taxes with precious little to show for it, reducing the UK's competitiveness, increasing spending in huge (Labour voting) swathes of the country to Soviet levels or crushing incentives to create the wealth we need to both close the defecit and pay down the £1 in every £4 spent that we currently borrow, this deranged, abusive, out-of-control lunatic has his hands all over the crime scene.

Having failed the first test of democracy he has faced outside of his constituency, one might expect Gordon Brown to have spent his time reflecting on his 'contribution' to the UK. Or perhaps make amends by devoting his time to serving his constituents. Not a bit of it. At the date of publication, the poor deluded folk of Kircaldy and Cowdenbeath have been represented in parliament for a mere handful of the 200 odd days for which their MP has been paid. Instead, Gordon Brown has devoted his time to knocking off this 300-page exercise in personal exculpation.

As he notes in his introduction, Brown is neither a financial expert nor an economist. Which might explain, but does not excuse, his lamentable diagnosis of the causes of the financial meltdown he fomented. It was all bankers paying themselves too much apparently. If only they'd paid themselves 10% less, all would have been fine. What about if public sector payrises had been pegged to inflation or a certain Chancellor hadn't raided - and thus destroyed - private sector pensions or what if the banking regulation system that had worked for hundreds of years had been left in place or what if the asset bubble had received some attention by, say, increasing the banks' capital adequacy ratios?

You can take your pick of brilliant hindsight-derived ideas, Gordon, but ultimately, you were in charge and your delusions about abolishing boom and bust meant you spent so much of our money, we now have to borrow just to pay off the interest. Your diagnosis is utter delusion from start to finish.

Nurse, the screens please...

Student protests - Democracy in action?

I think not...

Yesterday, thousands of 'students' descended on London to protest against the coalition Government's decision to allow universities to increase tuition fees. At least ten people have been arrested - including two arrests for assault on police, one on drunk and disorderly charges and six for violent disorder.

Twenty-two 'protesters' and nine officers are believed to have been injured. Six of the injured police required hospital treatment. In addition the Price of Wales' car was attacked, windows were smashed in Oxford Street and the Supreme Court building was vandalised.

And just to put the icing on the cake, in the true spirit of Christmas 'protestors' set fire to the Christmas tree in Trafalgar Square.

Note that I say 'students' and 'protestors' in inverted commas. They are not necessarily the same thing. I don't dispute that there is genuine bad feeling in the student community about the increase in fees, but at the end of the day these events have been largely orchestrated by left wing activists and anarchists. Anyone who doubts this, frankly, has rocks in their heads. Students exercising their right to lawful protest do not need to wear balaclavas...

Like the strikes of the Thatcher years, this is the first in the long line of 'events' orchestrated by the left to bring down a legally elected government. It's the way the left has always worked. It's the way it's working now. It's the start of another winter of discontent as this blog predicted some time ago.

I might perhaps have been less inclined to this view if the 'protestors' had been chanting "No to fees!" rather then "Tory scum!"

I support the right to peaceful protest and to freedom of speech. These are the cornerstones of democracy. I salute the members of the LibDem and Conservative parties who voted against these changes. They have followed their consciences and the wishes of their electorate. Some have resigned - quite rightly - from ministerial posts because of their beliefs. This is how democracy works and should continue to work.

What is not democratic is the rule of the mob. It should not be tolerated - now or ever.

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!

READ MORE » Piss Boiler of the the Week

The Quango Song (What a Waste!)

Look - just 'cos I'm out flying somewhere over the ocean doesn't mean that I can't just interject the odd nugget...

Here's a song I did with my favourite backing group, the Blockheads, to commemorate, hopefully, burning (or in this case drowning) all those quangos - although I'll believe it when I see it

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Piss boiler of the Year

Once in a while there is a statement by some complete cunt that gets me close to throwing a brick at the TV whilst simultaneously bursting several blood vessels. This is one of them !!!

Some fucking idiot at the Bank of England has decided that savers should stop moaning and start spending in order to hasten the economic recovery.

Charles Bean, the Deputy Governor, says that older households could afford to suffer because they benefitted from property price rises.

Mr Bean (you couldn't make that name up could you?) said he "fully sympathised". But he continued: "Savers shouldn't necessarily expect to be able to live just off their income in times when interest rates are low. It may make sense for them to eat into their capital a bit."

He added: "Very often older households have actually benefited from the fact that they've seen capital gains on their houses."

Well that might be all right for highly paid public servants with fucking great index linked pension pots paid for by the tax payer, but what about all us ordinary citizens who rely on their savings - hard earned savings I might add - to provide them with a living income to supplement the pathetic state pension ??

And to put that in perspective, according to the Bank of England 2010 Annual Report, Mr Bean's salary was over £250,000 a year and he added £188,000 to his pension pot - now worth over £1.4 million - so what the fuck would he know about living off his savings?

In the last couple of years - thanks in part to the same aforementioned fucking idiot cutting base rate - my savings returns have sunk from around 7% to well under 3%.

So let's try a little experiment. Let's cut the fucking idiot's pay by 60% and see how he gets on...

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...