BEWARE! THE BANKS ARE OUT TO GET YOU!

[Stanley]

See THIS Guardian article on the number of people who will be borrowing money to pay Xmas expenses.
More than a quarter of adults in the UK will use buy now, pay later to help with festive spending, research suggests, with the proportion rising to more than half of parents with young children. The survey for Citizens Advice also found 11% of respondents used such credit schemes to pay for groceries, a proportion that rose to 35% for regular BNPL users. The charity said it was braced for a new year of debt support as millions turned to companies that allow customers to stagger payments. Over the past year, there had been a 67% increase in people seeking help from Citizens Advice because they were struggling to pay back money owed from BNPL spending.
I can remember Peter flagging up the dangers of 'Buy now pay later' schemes and it appears he was on the money, it's reached the stage where it's a serious element in the economy. I think the Joseph Rowntree Foundation have issued a report on this but can't find it on the web yet.
I remember the Scottish tradition of entering the New Year debt free and am lucky enough to be in a position to do that. It would appear that a large proportion of the UK population have no chance of doing this.

[Tizer]

`FTSE 100 bosses earn UK average salary in three days, says High Pay Centre' LINK
`Bosses of Britain's biggest companies will have made more money in 2024 by lunchtime on Thursday than the typical worker will all year, research claims. By 13:00 GMT, the pay of FTSE 100 chiefs will have overtaken the £34,963 annual median wage for full-time workers, the High Pay Centre says. Including pensions, top bosses' average reward amounts to £3.81m per year, the centre says.'

[Stanley]

I heard that report Peter and noted it as you have. It's a disgrace and if common sense and moderation can't hold these injustices at bay then the law must. It should be made illegal to take this much out of a business while lower ranks struggle on low wages. The current problem with doctor's pay is a case in point.
One starter question should be "Who contributes most to the success and/or profitability of the enterprise"?

[PanBiker]

Stephenson and David Whip have both posted about the new banking hub coming to the former Paragon Library bit of Bank Buildings. Apparently it will have different representatives each day from Natwest, Santander, Lloyds, Barclays and HSBC. So that is two that we have never had and a glaring omission of probably the most popular bank when it was open, Yorkshire now Virgin. There will be no cash machine. Obvious questions being asked on social media, why didn't they use the existing redundant Barclays which already has all the facilities they would need, including the cash machine instead of converting premises that have never been a bank!

Questions also about why hasn't our new white elephant medical facilities been opened, it has been finished for a couple of months now. I think I may be able to answer that, I reckon Stephenson is banking, (excuse the pun) both projects for a major photo shoot in the run up to the election. Might come back to bite him as both have palmed us off with sub standard facilities for the town.

[Stanley]

"both have palmed us off with sub standard facilities for the town."
Couldn't agree more Ian and I think the answer to your question about why not base it in the Barclay building is the capital cost. Same with the tiny gesture at a medical centre in the Yorkshire building.
These are the local examples of the deep austerity drive that is affecting the whole of the UK and is the greatest indictment possible of Tory Governance and the effects of Brexit on the economy. I can't understand why this undoubted fact is not being used to hammer the Tories. Are they allowed to bugger up the country and not suffer for it?

[Stanley]

I note that the latest figures show that inflation rose slightly last month. I also noted that none of this rise could be attributed the the Red Sea cock-up and so presumably the effect of increased shipping costs will affect this months figures. Not a very cheerful prospect.

[Stanley]

Peter and I have railed against making it easier to take money out of pension pots and equity plans by a government desperate to increase economic activity. The consequences of fraud in this area have been evident for a while but now some very important people in this field are getting worried that HMRC are chasing tax on moneys withdrawn.
See THIS Yorkshire Post article.
An influential group of Parliamentarians has accused HMRC of chasing “low-hanging fruit” by levying tax charges against investment and pension fraud victims instead of targeting the advisers behind these crimes.
I heard the matter being reported on by Paul Lewis but can't find a free article.
However, it's clear it's a disaster ready to happen.

[Tizer]

`HSBC fined £57.4m for customer deposit protection failings' LINK
...One of HSBC's subsidiaries - HSBC Bank - was found to have incorrectly marked 99% of its eligible beneficiary deposits as "ineligible" for FSCS protection...

Yesterday I read in The Times about Barclays wrongly closing down lots of accounts of small businesses and then taking many months to clear the problem and give them back their accounts - and their money. Some business owners then (eventually) were sent their money - often 5 to 6 figures sums - as a cheque and they had to point out to the bank that they no longer had a working bank account and still couldn't access the cash. You couldn't make it up!

[PanBiker]

I paid into the Post Office yesterday on behalf of Bosom Friends. Shop takings and a couple of cheques which were from our local Rotary Group who organised the Santa Run last Christmas, (reported with photo in the Bosom Friends thread). The cheques totalled £2,000.00, the Post Office don't credit cheques they shove them in an envelope and send them to the bank. You get a receipt for the envelope but not what is in it. £2K turns into a receipt for £0.00, apparently it takes 5 days for the credit to appear. I suppose that's fair for a third party handler.

[Big Kev]

I can pay in cheques on my banking app, there is a £2k limit but it has been useful. Last time funds were available after two days.

[PanBiker]

I will have to ask our treasurer if we have the facility as well Kev. We tend to only get cheques now for larger fund raising donations.

[Stanley]

You'd almost think they regard customers as a nuisance.....

[Tizer]

No sooner than I'd posted about the fiasco at Barclays and HSBC I see this news...
`Bankers' bonuses: No cap under Labour, says Reeves' LINK

[Tripps]

I had a warning email from a bank last week advising that the use of A.I. in scam attempts was adding extra danger. They say it will eliminate telltale warning signs of poor English grammar, and spelling mistakes - and will make them altogether more convincing. I learn also that voices can be cloned easily and convincingly online - so those pleading messages from relatives to rescue them from financial situations may become more dangerous.

Stay alert and sceptical.

[Stanley]

A timely warning David. I have had another episode of emails telling me I am going to lose my emails. Spookily they coincided with an actual glitch in my system but luckily, being an irascible old bugger I had simply deleted all of them.
Perhaps that's the best defence, be anti-social and irascible and delete all mails from people you don't know or who are asking you for money!

[Stanley]

I met Lucy Brown, Stuart's daughter, on the town yesterday. She was trolling round Barlick to see if she could get any change as they had run out at the shop and she tells me that the Post Office no longer help traders by giving them change when they need it. I gave her a couple of fivers I had in my pocket and we'll sort out the difference on the order.
Has the Post office stopped functioning as a bank. On the same theme, what is the 'Banking Hub' that looks to be getting ready to open next to the old Yankee Bar? I ask because I see it has the Post Office logo on the name board. Is this the much heralded substitute for what used to be our banks. If so could Lucy's search for change get easier?

[Tripps]

So we have Lucy Brown looking for change, and Ian trying to get rid of it.

I wonder. . . .

Reminds me of the old joke - now thanks to inflation, updated, and verified, to be reality.

Have you got change of a fiver?
A fiver is change.

[PanBiker]

The counter facilities will be run by the Post Office Counters. Don't know yet whether they will up their game on the change front. For Sale notice is up on the Post Office so it looks like we may be losing that next unless someone buys it as going concern.

[Stanley]

What!! How can we manage without a Post Office? The country is closing down and we are sitting here watching it happen.
Yes David. That thought did occur to me as well.

[PanBiker]

The Post Office which occupies the former Weavers Union Rooms and Cricket Club upstairs is owned by the brother of the guy who runs it. The owner has reached retirement age and is looking to sell the business. I hope it does sell as a going concern but there is no guarantee that will be the case. The former Cricket Club upstairs has not been used and as far as I know is the same as it was when it closed.
Forty odd years ago when I was first involved with the Labour Party the Weavers, which had been absorbed into the GMB union was the HQ of the local party. We had all our meetings there and I had the branch offset litho printer in the committee room next door to the main room. Whenever I go in I always think of the many hours I spent in there printing our leaflets.

Sally and our Jack, Euro Elections.



David Blunkett and Offa with party members, he was guest speaker at one of our events. Gordon is on there and our Jack is about 6 years old so it's around 1992.

[Stanley]

Lovely Ian. That was in the days when we had a Labour Party with powers to function locally. Centralising everything in London was the biggest mistake ever. Look what it did to the Scottish Labour Party, destroyed it.
As for the banks and the Post Office, there should be some sort of legislation that forces them to operate local services as part of their license to do business. As it is they are free to walk away at any time and leave us in the lurch. I wonder who designed that regime, could it by any chance have been the banks and the Post Office via their lobbyists?

[PanBiker]

When the GMB sold the building and we had been given notice of eviction we "liberated" a couple of the 1930's folding wooden chairs of which we had about 50. We gave the printer to another branch. I was branch Secretary at the time. I got a letter from the regional GMB secretary asking for the chair back. So I did as I was asked and took one back, which went straight in the skip along with all the others and the trestle tables we had for events and running elections on polling days! Not sure what happened to the big mahogany committee room table and comfy chairs. I still have the other chair, which has been lent on occasion for family gatherings and the like and is always know as "the weavers chair"

Incidentally, all the posters you see in the photos were cut and pasted by me!

Slightly off topic but who cares? It's a Post Office now and has the only (very tenuous) banking counter service remaining in the town and it's up for sale.

[Stanley]

Not off piste at all Ian as far as I am concerned. It's good history. Here just in case anyone is wondering what GMB stands for....
GMB (trade union) - Wikipedia. In 1982, following a merger with the Amalgamated Society of Boilermakers, Shipwrights, Blacksmiths and Structural Workers (ASBSBSW), the union was renamed the General, Municipal, Boilermakers' and Allied Trade Union (GMBATU). This was sometimes shortened to "GMB", which in 1987 became the official name of the union.

[PanBiker]

Edna Greenwood who you see directly behind David Blunkett was the Local GMB rep and organiser. Her husband Gerry is at the front with our Jack on the right. The woman to the right of Gordon is Louise Dawson who was an extraordinary fund raiser for the branch. Bert Graves is missing from the photo, he was our branch membership secretary and would visit members to collect their subs weekly if required. We regularly got 20+ members at our monthly meetings.

Just realised Sally's bike had a front wheel hub dynamo. It was blue originally and I stripped it down, refurbished it and spray painted it red, of course!

[Stanley]

I think THIS belongs here....
Executives at water companies could lose their bonuses in future if the firm they run causes environmental damage, like letting illegal sewage spills pollute a beach or river. Environment Secretary Stephen Barclay said it was time water company bosses "took responsibility". Campaigners and opposition parties said they had been calling for restrictions on water boss bonuses for some time.
This is ridiculous! It goes without saying that if a firm is being operated as a debt cash machine and under-investing to the point where the environment is being drowned in unprocessed waste severe sanctions should be imposed and of course bonuses for executives should be stopped'
Ask yourselves why this is not being done.....