Bring back a National Bank like Giro Bank?

lostinrates

Many contracts of sale of business include a requirment for the vendor not to set up the same business model again within a period of time. I can't remeber what this is called ATM or what the standard periods of time are, but it could be a reason why this wouldn't be possible?

Non compete clause? anti competition clause? Something like that

ninky_2

I would have thought the government was immune to this legislation? So are you saying if an industry is privatised it can never be nationalised again?

baileysbattlebus

Girobank was set up in 1968 by Harold Wilson for people (the majority) who didn't have bank accounts.

It was the biggest cash handling bank in the country - it had 12000 corportate clients - remember the giro slip on bills etc - infact the slip is probably still there.

It was the first bank to offer telephone banking

It was the first bank to offer free current accounts for accounts kept in credit - forcing other banks to do the same.

It was the first bank to offer interest bearing current accounts - forcing other banks to do the same.

It was Britains 6th biggest bank

It allowed people to pay their bills, gas, electric, phone etc,for free whether you banked with them or not.

It handled cash for 12000 corporate clients

It was in every post office. It still is, under the A&L brand, though it's a cash handling mechanism now.

It never made large profits

I think it was sold in 1990. It lost it's name in 2003 when people were forced to open bank accounts for benefits and pensions.

Would I mind if we had another one - no definitely not.

You can put me down as a yes

socrates

First, nationalised institutions are lazy and rubbish. They have no customer interest at heart and politicians and civil servants have no idea how to run a business. The result is that you just get big, fat, incompetent, useless operations, managed abysmally. They are happy to run like this because they lift their money directly from taxpayers’ pockets and have no worries about funding therefore.


Second, nationalised institutions do nothing to move things forward. They just keep their engines running with incremental spending. The result is that there is zero innovation or creative thinking. Nationalised institutions aren’t there to innovate, they’re just there to operate.
Third, if nationalisation is such a good thing, then why did we tell China to stop it?
In the case of China, the state-owned banks were accused for years of serving the State’s interests and not the people’s. China’s citizens were encouraged to save and not borrow, they pooled all their monies into the State’s banks who treated them like victims rather than customers, and the State moved all that money into State projects, such as railroads, farming and manufacturing.


Then, in 2001, China was told to open up the banks to competition and free market forces if they wanted to join the World Trade Agreement and start trading freely with the world.


Result: China has been opening up their banking market and allowing foreigners to compete and invest. They have move from nationalised banks to privatise banks because the world’s market dictate that this is the way it has to be.

socrates

baileysbattlebus wrote: »

Girobank was set up in 1968 by Harold Wilson for people (the majority) who didn't have bank accounts.

It was the biggest cash handling bank in the country - it had 12000 corportate clients - remember the giro slip on bills etc - infact the slip is probably still there.

It was the first bank to offer telephone banking

It was the first bank to offer free current accounts for accounts kept in credit - forcing other banks to do the same.

It was the first bank to offer interest bearing current accounts - forcing other banks to do the same.

It was Britains 6th biggest bank

It allowed people to pay their bills, gas, electric, phone etc,for free whether you banked with them or not.

It handled cash for 12000 corporate clients

It was in every post office. It still is, under the A&L brand, though it's a cash handling mechanism now.

It never made large profits

I think it was sold in 1990. It lost it's name in 2003 when people were forced to open bank accounts for benefits and pensions.

Would I mind if we had another one - no definitely not.

You can put me down as a yes

Yes but could they offer all those services now?

lostinrates

ninky wrote: »

I would have thought the government was immune to this legislation? So are you saying if an industry is privatised it can never be nationalised again?

I dunno, I'm no solicitor, but it is my understanding that the governent should not be above the law. I smile wryly while i type though.

ninky_2

If nationalised banks are so lazy, rubbish and lacking in innovation then how come Giro Bank was such as successful idea. It may not have made a huge profit for it's shareholders but it served us, the customers. As I and others have pointed out, it was also HUGELY innovative.

The privately run banks however have proved their incompetence time and time again and are costing us the taxpayer BILLIONS. That is going to aversely affect our economy along with services like schools, hospitals etc etc for many many years to come.

Although China may have been moving to a more privatised model it still has more state intervention through the China Banking Regulatory COmmission than ANY other world player. And from what I understand economically it is in a much stronger position than us.

socrates

ninky wrote: »

If nationalised banks are so lazy, rubbish and lacking in innovation then how come Giro Bank was such as successful idea. It may not have made a huge profit for it's shareholders but it served us, the customers. As I and others have pointed out, it was also HUGELY innovative.

The privately run banks however have proved their incompetence time and time again and are costing us the taxpayer BILLIONS. That is going to aversely affect our economy along with services like schools, hospitals etc etc for many many years to come.

Although China may have been moving to a more privatised model it still has more state intervention through the China Banking Regulatory COmmission than ANY other world player. And from what I understand economically it is in a much stronger position than us.

It may have been successful because it did not need to show a profit.

The banks costing us billions is related to a whole heap of variables and having nationalised banks would not have made any difference whatsoever.

For example how many 'hidden' billions have been spent on the recent wars - that money had to come from somewhere.

I agree with govt intervention - in Lebanon - the strategy was tight lending criteria (similar to what is happening here now) - minimum deposits etc.

In Cyprus for example - the banks employs its own valuers NOT independent ones (we all know what they are capable of)

Girobank catered for a particular sector of the market - that sector is more than catered for now. We are in different times - what we really needed was govt tightening of regulations ages ago - easy to say in hindsight.

I can see we will not agree on this subject so lets just say we agree to disagree.

Rochdale_Pioneers

Pennywise wrote: »

Look at the railways, they were still building new steam locomotives when they knew they'd be scrapped almost as soon as they came off the production line, and at the same time, they were building diesel locomotives to replace them, also at the same time, investing in new road networks and in the knowledge that rail transport was declining. So new steamies, at the same time as new diesels to replace the steamies, at the same time as knowing that probably neither would be used for more than a few years.

Yes lets look at the railways. Lets look at the final years of British Rail, when its Intercity business unit was the ONLY long distance rail operator in the world to make a profit.

I'll give you a clue as to how profitable the various companies that run these routes in the wonderful privatised world are. The profit number has a minus on the front and a lengthy string of digits. We keep getting franchises coming along saying "we'll pay you a profit, give us the contract" - and quickly enough it all goes pear shaped. Virgin Trains went bust and is now a management contract with a vast subsidy. GNER promised £1.7bn in profit payments to the government and folded inside 18 months of its second contract, to be replaced by National Express who having bid £1.8bn in payments (with 18 months less to pay it) and now desperately trying to renegotiate their contract before the vast costs of the rail division cripples the whole company.

Look, there is no sane argument that nationalisation is bad and privatisation good - or the other way round. That is dogma. Clearly some industries are better in private hands and some better in public hands (compare and contrast the NHS with America for example). But you can't take banking and argue that government ownership is a disaster when Girobank was a market-leading success and so many private banks have gone spectacularly bust.

Not with fact or logic to back you up anyway. Which is where dogma comes in. BTW I am all in favour of a new Girobank. I bank with A&L now and being able to use the post office is very handy.

baileysbattlebus

BT is another one - since privatisation dealing with BT drains your will to live.

Going from one automated answer to another, until you end up back where you started. Or the Indian call centre and "Jason" or "Tracy" reading from a script that they can't deviate from, or in the end help, or accuse you of being racist if you ask to be put through to a UK centre, where hopefully someone will be able to understand and help you.

The dumbing down of BT engineers skills - who were once highly trained - now several people each learn a small of part of the original engineers role. Where once one person could come out and sort out your problem - now it takes several and several visits. For us -
1 to dig a trench in the garden -
1 to lay a cable for next door (we had split cable and only one broadband could be run from it - ours)
1 to run the cable from the outside box to next door.
1 to come and sort our phone line as it didn't work after the works had been completed and it shouldn't have been effected
1 to come and refill the trench

It took about 3 weeks and endless calls. efficient I think not.

The tax payer liability for about half of BT pensions -

The water companies are another - Severn Trent water were fined millions not so very long for over charging their customers, deliberately as far as I can remember.

Southern Water were fined millions for deliberately overcharging too - they not only deceived their customers but the regulator too.