Swanky offices
You would have thought that as we're spending your money we'd have been a little more careful with the rent you're paying.
After all, Chelmsford, Basildon or even Bournemouth (nice beach) would have been just as good and may have suited you better.
But, alas, you gave us your cheque book and now we're busy spending your money on some of the most expensive real estate in Europe.
Staff 'U' Like
We send boys out to do a man's job. That's what they tell us.
Sometimes we even pretend not to speak the language.
Yo soy un enviado de las Islas Canarias. Por favor, sea amable conmigo. Soy nuevo aquí. You see, genuine misunderstandings of the linguistic variety help us avoid understanding any financial malarky which just might embarrass our banking chums.
"Lo siento, es todo para mí holandés!" is truly the passport to success in the regulation business these days with Italian makng a showing as the up and coming language of utter financial chaos amongst our European regulatory cousins.
Or as we like to put it - linguaggio del caos finanziario!
Power
When dear Gordy conjured us up out of hot air he made sure that we were independent of parliament. You see, he was dreaming of being independent of parliament himself so it was quite natural, really. But one day he awoke with a start and realised it would mean the end of the fat salary and gold plated pension.
What a nightmare!.
Since the Downing Street squat came to such an uncerimonious end he's occupied himself by writing his memoirs for profit whilst being paid by the tax payer for his parliamentary and constituency duties.
Has anyone seen Gordy in parliament since the Election? (Apart from once or twice when he made a complete and utter fool of himself).
Yet he still gets his salary and entitlement to a fat public sector pension (at your expense) without having to do any real work at all. He's persona non grata at Labour Party gigs these days. Deservedly so.
Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
We learned that from Gordy. But now he's not taking our calls anymore. Damn cheek!.
Parliament BUTT OUT!
We've managed to keep the Treasury Select Committee at bay. For now.
We rejected their findings out of hand. Just like that! In fact, we told them to piss off, we're busy.
It was as if we couldn't even be bothered to read their comments. No sooner did they issue their findings amid widespread and grave concerns about RDR than we rejected them. After all, how could reducing the number of advisers by 40% and forcing those that remain to charge every client a fee, possibly increase the availability of independent financial advice?
All this just at the time the country's savings ratio is at rock bottom.
But how could that have anything to do with us?
You see, we're here to protect the public and that's what we told them. We even sent Saint Hector along to make apologetic noises. Anything to get those bloody politicians out of our hair so that we can get on with the job.
Those MPs just don't understand what we're here for. They get all agitated about the predicted failings of RDR and the impact on their constituents whilst we're here preparing for our next job in strangulation. Sorry, regulation.
It's all so bloody annoying!
Soft Corruption
One of the great things about socialists is that we never waste a crisis.
Never.
So, during the banking crises (we've lost count, how many have there been now?) we were making more than the occassional trip to the, ahem, bookmaker, er... , stock broker.
Well, it stands to reason. We knew what was happening even if we didn't know when it would happen (or so we claimed) so why let all that knowledge go to waste. If we didn't make use of it someone else would, right? .
Some pretty fancy cars started to appear on the streets around here whilst all that banking crisis was going on. Five thousand beer tokens for a car stereo sounded pretty reasonable and it looked so pretty in the dashboard.
What a shame the girlfriend didn't like it. She was so yesterday.Va va Vroooom.....!....
Restricted Supply
What we don't want is the man on the street saving too much tax.
No, no, no. That wouldn't do at all, Too much self-reliance and all that naff right wing stuff is bad for the Party. It so didn't play well at the Election.
So to make sure the man on the Clapham omnibus pays more tax when he seeks financial advice on how to pay less tax, we've introduced the Retail Distribution Review.
What was previously VAT free will now be VATable. That's sort of ironic, don't you think? Pay tax to save tax.
Clever, eh?
By making advice more expensive for all (no cross subsidies here) we've ensured that more people will be denied access to financial advice. And the fewer people seeking good independent (what does that bloody word mean?) advice the more tax they'll pay.
Simples!
Dependency Culture
Socialism demands dependency on the state. It's de rigueur.
The more we convince you of our heartfelt and genuine desire to protect you, the consumer, from people just like you (yes, your fellow citizens), the more you will trust us.
See the pattern emerging here?
After all, how can you trust anyone other than government (the people who collect tax) for information on how to pay less tax if all commercial supply channels for financial information and advice have been shut down because we've educated you to distrust them?
Anything we distrust, we avoid. Right?
Oh, and by the way, any financial advice businesses that do continue to trade in the hostile environment we are setting up for them will be priced beyond your reach. We've already seen to that.
Unless you're rich, of course!
You see, socialism is very, very unfair. Always was, always will be.
It's the opposite of what the Labour Party told you.
When they use the word FAIR what they really mean is MORE TAX FOR US and dependency on so-called 'services' for you. What a shame they're never available when required! It's the classic bait and switch. You'll never know what you're entitled to, and all the time taxes keep going up and up.
Magic!
Do you doubt this?
Well, look at Blair, Brown & Co. and the union leaders. How much do they earn?
How much do we earn? Clue: It's a bloody lot of money.
Now, how much do YOU earn?.
See, told you so!
There was a reason nobody wanted to grab hold of all that Third Way crap. It may as well have been the Third Rail.
Ouch!
British financial services were highly successful before we inserted our grubby little finger
London is the fincancial capital of the world.
For now.
But we're working hard to change that. By gold-plating every European directive (bless the dear comrades in Brussels) that crosses our desks we ensure prosperity for us and economic slowdown for you lot.
It's all part of the plan for government control of business - we want business to function how we think business should function. Of course, we've never run a business ourselves (unless running it into the ground counts for anything) but we've read a lot about it.
In fact, we're doing such a good job that many financial institutions are promising to leave the UK. So, we've got to be careful here:
Get the balance right - just enough tightening of the screws to cause a headache, combined with periodic relaxation of the pressure so firms will stay to pay our juicy fees (taxes to you lot), equals success.
Get the balance wrong - so firms leave for foreign climes and our fees (tax) will be threatened. We'll have buggered it up completely!
Not only that, it would also prejudice our knighthoods and soil the nest for the next generation of bureaucrats.
Of course, we learned all this from the former Soviet satellite states of Eastern Europe. The practice was so widespread there people were literally prepared to run the gauntlet of barbed wire fences with machine gun emplacements and minefields to escape. For some reason people just don't believe us when we tell them the fences were there to keep capitalism out!
It's an inversion of a well known teaching technique (intermittent positive reinforcement) which is highly successful when applied diligently or, as in our case, ruthlessly.
According to many commentators, "London's position as a financial centre is now threatened." All that fuss about levies and the 50% tax rate on high earners combined with pension rules that create marginal tax rates of over 100% and some sinister utterings by the hard left in the person of Lord (of what?) Adair Turner, our Great Leader, have set the tone for a mass exodus of talent.
A poll of Bloomberg subscribers found that Britain had dropped behind Singapore into third place as the city most likely to be the best financial hub a very short time from now.
A survey of executives by the respected law firm, Eversheds found that Shanghai could overtake London within the next ten years.
Meanwhile, we get on with our business of destroying yours.
Guidance Notes
No. 1. Every socialist government ends in financial disaster.
No. 2. Every socialist policy damages the people it claims to protect.
No. 3. Socialists tell us what they are doing by accusing us of doing it.
No. 4. Socialists are socialists first, before anything else.
No. 5. To learn the motive of any policymaker, FOLLOW THE MONEY.
Once these principles are grasped, a true understanding of what socialists have planned for you, your loved ones and your money can be fully appreciated.
