Iceland,the warning signs for councils charities etc.

twokcc

It is looking more likely that all the local authorities, police and transport authories, charities etc will not be bailed out by the government for any investments they have with Icelandic banks. A local authorities representative has been on TV/radio saving that they were only following central government guidelines to get the best return on investment and the Icelantic banks were all highly rated by the credit agencies. General theme is "Its not our fault" so lets get Brown ro bail us out. However most of these organisations have highly paid (6 figure salaries) and it make you wonder what they were doing to earn this super salaries. Which ever way its Joe Bloggs who will be picking up the tab with even higher council tax bills or cut in services(don't expect to see many diversity officers or whatever loosing there jobs). They will also be able to retire at 60 without the same reduction in pensions that we have all are likely to suffer if we have stock market investments and not inflation proof final salary pensions.
The financial officers should have seen the warning signs.
This is article from 10th Feb 08 sunday times
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/money/savings/article3340734.ece

They might then have had the nounce to find some information about the compansation scheme
www.sedlabanki.is/lisalib/getfile.aspx?itemid=2915
Takes a lot of reading but I wouldn't be investing 5p never mind £5million after reading this.
Its about time some heads rolled of the people who took these decisions- why should they be coconed whilst we all have a long period of austerity and belt tightening.
There will be a lot more fall out from the Icelandic banks going bust but if we just continue to do has we have in past things will not change. We have had so many examples of missellling(endowment mortgages, equitable life pensions etc) its about time that the people who keep robbing us of our money should be called to account for there actions.

casper_uk

They invested the money, they are the only ones to blame, more typical it's not my fault from councils It's not like the government twisted their arms behind the back and forced them to invest in Iceland. Other councils managed not to invest so they can't really blame the government!

edwinac_2

Telford & Wrekin Council apparently foresaw the problems in Iceland, and pulled its cash from Landsbanki over a month ago. Shame they didn't warn anyone else.

There is a full table in the Financial Times showing how much each council has lost in the Icesave collapse.

Kent County Council, Nottingham City Council and Norfolk County Council, top the table. Kent has "lost" £50m alone :eek:

roddydogs

So why did Martin," Which" magazine, Daily
Mail, and several Daily Papers still recommend them till this week?

halight

Why are our coucils putting our money into banks abrourd?????
Should thay not be sorpoeting british banks and bussiness?
Were i live our green whiley bins and black boxs for our paper and bottles come from a french company and are made in franch. But just up the road from were i live there is a company that make them.
Its about time we put our maney into our incomany!

The councils are to blame for putting our monay at risk in a non british bank not us so thay should be made to find ways to make the money back with ouy charging us more coucil tax

halight

sorry for the rant above... It just makes me mad....

By the way i really do hope that the Gov can get our peoples savings and our coucils maony back.

i also think that best buy tables should also take risck into account when listing the best buys..

amistupid

It must be the viking spirit that's made them brave enough to rob our Old Bill.
Mind you maybe the Police wil now known how it feels to be a victim of crime and how painfully slow the compensation scheme is.

dag_2

When was the last time that blame paid the rent? When was the last time that blame paid the bills? When was the last time that blame paid the salaries of teachers, care assistants, and bin men?

I can't see that there's any point in blaming anyone. Surely it's more important to figure out how to make sure that our schools, care homes, police forces and local authority services keep running than it is to figure out who's fault it was?

If it's the council's fault, then council tax goes up. On the other hand, if it's central government's fault for dodgy advice, central government bails them out, and our central taxes such income tax, capital gains tax, corporation tax, VAT go up and/or cuts are made to state benefits, state pensions and tax credits (probably both). Either way, we taxpayers still get screwed for it.

Unless you can pin the blame on someone who's actually got some assets to sell that they could use to compensate the local authorities with - but what with the credit crunch, and the associated stock market and property crash, there aren't many scapegoats around who are still rich. There's certainly no point in blaming anyone from Iceland.

baby_boomer

I read yesterday that this crisis is set to cost the average Icelander the equivalent of a £116,000 mortgage.

If this site were based in Iceland, I suspect the views expressed would be a) stronger and b) from the opposite perspective :rotfl:

This is going to strangle Icelanders for generations to come.

Icelandic PM blames Gordon Brown for sabotaging Iceland's economy and proposing illegal action

They must hate us big time .

roddydogs wrote: »

So why did Martin," Which" magazine, Daily
Mail, and several Daily Papers still recommend them till this week?

Did they actively recommend them or just include them in the best buy tables supplied to them by MoneyFacts?

beingjdc

Look, I agree that they should have removed the money, BUT:

If they had removed the money, and not warned the public, then given they are the Trading Standards authorities, what would the reaction on here have been?

I can guess.

"My evil council feathered their own nest and took all Iceland's money and now they can't give me my Icesave ISA back boo hoo hoo".

opinions4u

roddydogs wrote: »

So why did Martin," Which" magazine, Daily
Mail, and several Daily Papers still recommend them till this week?

Becuase they were highlighting the best interest rates offered by organisations authorised to accept deposits in the UK.

Authorised by the powers that be.

Hence a large chunk of the blame lies with the FSA and HM Government.