I had not thought I should write in support of Sir Fred Goodwin, nor any other banker, but the sinister orchestration of media voices baying for his blood has brought out my mothering instincts. 

Leave Freddie alone. No one, so far, has alleged that he has done anything criminal. He signed a contract  which seemed reasonable to those who offered it to him.  He is entitled to expect that contract is honoured.  

It is easy to whip up a clamour for his ritual stoning, tarring and feathering, when you are asked whether it is reasonable that the tax payer should be asked to stump up £33 million for his pension.  It is a ridiculous sum of money.  So are all the other sums of money that the tax payer is being asked to pay.   However, I don’t see the banking crisis as being Freddie’s personal fault. He was just the monkey,  doing what he was asked to do –  and I am deeply suspicious that it is the organ grinder and his henchmen who are behind this constant drip of innuendo designed to paint Freddie as personally culpable.     

You don’t change the off side rule half way through a championship match, and that is what is being suggested should happen to Freddie. Gordon Brown has been scrupulous in his choice of words regarding Banking bonuses – ‘we shouldn’t reward failure’ – we never have done, nor is it proposed that we do so now. What is being proposed is that someone be denied the reward they earned for what was considered success at the time. 

Gordon Brown, the micro managing Chancellor of the Exchequer, presided over the changes to the banking system that allowed the bubble to burst. He presided over the FSA who should have been drawing attention to the fact that it was a bubble. Freddie happened to be the last person invited, nay hired, to blow into the ballon, according to the rules at that time.  He was offered a lot of money to do so because it was believed that he was likely to do so more effectively than anyone else. He did.  It burst. 

Blame the man at the top. Gordon Brown, don’t fall for the politics of envy. The stories being fed to the papers at the moment are on a par with ‘Freddie Goodwin ate my pension’, they are manufactured propaganda, designed to take your eye off the real culprit.

Margaret March 2, 2009 at 20:48

I was sympathetic to Sir Fred the Shred last week but the more I read about
him the more I realise how much he is personally responsible for the mess RBS
is in right now. Mr megalomaniac.
The government have messed up his
severance package big time and now the public are braying for blood – must be
a nightmare for poor old Gordon. How does he sleep at night?
I bank with
RBS and I employ an ex RBS teller who is brilliant but had to leave RBS
because of stress which she had never suffered from before or since working
for RBS.
She said the target driven culture was unbelievable.
I have to
go to the bank every day and they still ask me “Is there anything else we can
do for you today”. YES! You can shut-up with your ‘I have attended sales
school’ claptrap. That does the trick with the new tellers of which there
seems to be one every second week.
Another problem I have with RBS is that
it appears to me that the women employees run the branch and every couple of
months they replace the manager with another gink. Always a simpering man and
always a fund of useless information. Has not a clue!
Is Fred
mysoginistic??

Karen March 2, 2009 at 03:58

Except I didn’t.

Coco

He was 38 when he became chief exec of the Clydesdale (which is owned by
the Bank of Australia) – it caused a lot of snorting.
Thankfully he was
headhunted after 2 years & ironically wasn’t so bad at the RBS (apart from
wrecking it, obviously…).

Karen March 2, 2009 at 02:22

Now I really will go and lie down….

Karen March 2, 2009 at 02:21

Of course loads of people are to blame for the current financial crisis –
going back to the 1980s when Mrs T. thought all Britain needed was services
industries and the City – but Fred really isn’t nice.

His sales target regime was so bad no one could cope & my Mum didn’t
eat or sleep well for the years she was stuck with him.
I kept hearing
stories about suicides, extreme bullying, older staff leaving in disgust,
young staff using high pressure sales tactics on customers… it was hell.

Karen March 2, 2009 at 01:55

After that ordeal – I shall now go and lie down….

Karen March 2, 2009 at 01:52

I was saying… re-Fred the Shred.

My Mum worked with him at the Clydesdale and he was so hated – there was
cheering and celebrations when he left and my Mother thinks he’s an arrogant
bastard who wanted to be an international banker and who (may have) not
mentioned the RBS’s problems till he safely had his pension (which isn’t’
illegal – but it isn’t moral).

Karen March 2, 2009 at 01:49

I really can’t deal with having 2 email addresses.

Sorry Anna – you got the start of one and the end of the other!!!

Karen March 2, 2009 at 01:48

re- Fred the Shred.

There was cheering and celebrations when he left the Clydesdale Bank (which
is still solvent – as far as my Mother will tell me).

According to Mum (and she knew & worked with him) – he was an arrogant
bastard (my Mother never swears – but that’s how much she hates him) who
wanted to be an International banker and who covered up the RBS’s problems
till he got his pension.

Coco March 2, 2009 at 01:37

Sorry I missed you Saul. I wanted to let you know that I am at the bottom
of the garden …………… having tapassy-type things to eat.

Coco March 2, 2009 at 01:34

Glo! Glo! Where are you? Have you gone to the Land of Nod?

Coco March 2, 2009 at 01:32

Before everybody jumps on me because they went to public schools ………… I
don’t mean decent places like Dulwich College etc. You know the Half-Wit
schools and colleges I mean!!!

Coco March 2, 2009 at 01:27

I blame it on exclusive clubs Gloria. I don’t blame it on exclusive and
desperately expensive public schools. We need exclusive and desperately
expensive schools to keep all the little greedy stupid fuckers in one place so
that we know what breeding stable they came from. I always find that their
smug-fuck faces have never changed since school-days as well.

Whenever they enter into their top-jobs in Government and commerce I always
look back at school photos of these whizz-kids – and they always have the same
ugly mug they had when they were at school. And I notice all the cohorts they
had then …………. are mysteriously still hanging around them years and years
later.

How do they always manage to do this? Play blood-brothers when they should
be doing their prep? Or do they make a pact and say -’I promise to lick your
arse every day through our teens, twenties, thirties, forties, fifties ……………..
if you promise to lick mine and my Daddy’s arse and all the people who work at
his bank and companies until we die or are tortured in the Tower of
London.’

Gloria Smudd
March 2, 2009 at 00:55

I do, Coco, I do remember. Today’s mucky mess has nothing to do with his
particular preferences and weaknesses though, I am sure.

Today’s mucky mess is rising around the ankles of the brand new King
Canutes, those sharp-suited clever-clogs who turned up with the blessing of
‘those on high’ to bet at our prestigious City gambling dens every day,
betting on their quick-fire intuition in a game played with other people’s
money, and banking that the tide could never possibly push the sticky floating
turds of their filthy gambles back onto their shiny successful shoes. How
surprised must they have they been lately that their toxic debts have let off
such a stink.

Coco March 1, 2009 at 23:56

Look at his eyes Gloria! Lokk at his eyes! And the way he moves. He looks
like he has something stuck up his bottom.

I believe a lot of high-powered people become fixated with things that we
lesser mortals would not dream of messing about with. Remember that MP with a
Jaffa up his jaxy?

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 23:18

The Name of the Rose, by Ungeberto Ecco, Saul?

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 23:17

A good point Coco. Straight or bent, his teeth are sunk with the vice-like
grip of a mastiff into rubber-stamped and fully-authorised pension
arrangements.

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 23:12

Eeeewwww. Ha! Monica!

Saul March 1, 2009 at 23:11

A Moniker by any other Rose…

Coco March 1, 2009 at 23:08

Gloria asked ……….. ” ……….. do you think he

Coco March 1, 2009 at 23:04

The reference to venerable venereal disease should not worry us Gloria. We
are protected. The venerability of the diseases is because of where they came
from ………………. A bit of a Monica story there. Uggghhhhhh!

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 23:00

Have we had Annie Get Your Gunge?

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 22:58

Coco – now that he’s got all that money he’s not going to give back, do you
think he’ll spend a few quid on getting his teeth straightened?

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 22:57

Saul – I’ll allow that the Ungel Bert Humperdink post is possibly the best
this evening. However, I prefer Grunge myself.

Coco March 1, 2009 at 22:56

I am afraid that I would shred Freddie. In his shreddies on the steps of
the Bank of England.

I think I don’t like him because he looks like a weasel. His eyes are in
the wrong place for a human.

Just wondering if he is one of the youngest Wunderkind. ……………. Is he?

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 22:54

I doubt that I’ll ever be able to expUNGE the more graphic details of
Coco’s post from my delicate memory. Whatever can she mean???? I have enough
ether from my own end not to need Coco’s powerful emissions, but the reference
to venerable venereal disease has got this Hollywood Hippo wielding her scythe
everywhichway, just in case!

Coco March 1, 2009 at 22:50

Janes!!! Am here ………….. lurking about. Waiting for my Burmese to draw her
last breaths.

I love Guns n Roses Janes. November Rain and I Used to Love Her. I once
thought about marrying Duff McKagan ………………..

janes March 1, 2009 at 22:49

Great, another spell!

Saul March 1, 2009 at 22:49

Ungel Bert Humperdinck can sing the theme tune then. Man with the Golden
Gunge

Coco March 1, 2009 at 22:48

Anna Raccoon said, ”Don

janes March 1, 2009 at 22:47

Take revunge Saul, take revunge.

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 22:46

Much. In fact we’ve reached the Seven Year Unge.

Saul March 1, 2009 at 22:45

I take it that it is too late for my Camels spins then…

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 22:45

Mission Ungepossible.

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 22:43

Back from the Taboggonist?

janes March 1, 2009 at 22:42

Ungentlemen prefer blondes – where’s Coco?

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 22:42

Night Anna!

Saul March 1, 2009 at 22:42

Smoking Puns

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 22:41

An Officer and An Ungentleman?

janes March 1, 2009 at 22:41

I’m off too – to listen to some puns and roses.

janes March 1, 2009 at 22:40

Unge!

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 22:39

Punfight at the OK Corral

Anna Raccoon
March 1, 2009 at 22:40

Night all, really am off now…….

janes March 1, 2009 at 22:39

Just one more: Lock Stock and Two Smoking Tuns …

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 22:37

I think you’ve just got that, janes! (Smudd slopes off, muttering “Unge”
….)

janes March 1, 2009 at 22:36

Top Pun?

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 22:36

The Good, The Bad And The Ungely

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 22:35

Punsmoke?

janes March 1, 2009 at 22:32

Naked gun.

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 22:31

(that’s two really)

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 22:31

Bullet Point Blank?

janes March 1, 2009 at 22:30

The guns I’ll never own.

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 22:29

What about if I make it just a narrow feint? Will you allow me a small
margin for error?

janes March 1, 2009 at 22:27

Feinting is no good now – I’ve got your measure.

Anna Raccoon
March 1, 2009 at 22:29

Ten metre one at least, janes…….

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 22:27

Back to the musicals then – I’ll start: Annie Gatling-Gunne?

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 22:26

She

janes March 1, 2009 at 22:26

That’s it, rattle them out.

Saul March 1, 2009 at 22:26

It’s not Rocket Science..

janes March 1, 2009 at 22:23

Please, not dancing puns, I can’t swing around that one.

Anna Raccoon
March 1, 2009 at 22:24

Gatling puns then?

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 22:23

And now she’s angry…..

Saul March 1, 2009 at 22:23

Trying to put a new spin on things..

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 22:23

Just think! She’s almost certain to have night-goggles too. Ooer, lumme!
Night-goggles and an unge. I think we are doomed, all doomed ….

janes March 1, 2009 at 22:22

NO ANNA – IT’S PONTING THE WRONG WAY!

janes March 1, 2009 at 22:20

Think of the tank as Matilda, it sounds so much more gentle than
Sherman.

Anna Raccoon
March 1, 2009 at 22:21

Stop waltzing around.

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 22:19

The ‘unge’ I can live with, I can even accept she’s not overly fond of
ducks or black cats; it’s the idea that she’s looking down the sights of a
Sherman tank that I can’t quite gloss over. Call me over-cautious if you
will….

Anna Raccoon
March 1, 2009 at 22:21

She’s got her own paintball range too……calls it a garden, but I don’t
trust that tank, she was very insistent that it faced that way too……….

janes March 1, 2009 at 22:15

Time is an illusion Anna, and I have often been quite something in the
night.

janes March 1, 2009 at 22:12

Unge …

Anna Raccoon
March 1, 2009 at 22:14

She is a bit ‘something of the night’, isn’t she?

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 22:09

Find a duck, shoot it, unge, …
………………………………………
Kill a black cat and
place a broad bean in each eye, …
……………………………………….

I see a pattern emerging here. Let us examine the evidence. Two posts in
quick succession referring to animal slaughter followed by the unlikely
juxtaposition of either a limb or an allotment vegetable. And the word ‘unge’.
I dread to think what Fitz would make of this psychological profile….

Get her somewhere quiet and dark as soon as possible, by whatever means.
I’d plump for the fork-lift myself, together with all the chains and flashing
lights available. Secure a blue-light escort if necessary. This one sounds
dangerous.

janes March 1, 2009 at 22:08

Sloping off again then?

Saul March 1, 2009 at 22:08

I’ve run out of Benson and Sledges, I’m off to the Tobogganists to get a
packet…..

Anna Raccoon
March 1, 2009 at 22:09

I’m off to bed, I’m an hour later than you lot and it was a heavy day
yesterday, need to be bright eyed and bushey tailed in the morning.

janes March 1, 2009 at 22:05

Just as long as you are not using sleight of hand.

Saul March 1, 2009 at 22:04

I’m on the cresta of a run..

janes March 1, 2009 at 22:02

Not now the snow’s gone.

Saul March 1, 2009 at 22:00

Not luge then, thank goodness for that..

janes March 1, 2009 at 21:57

I meant lunge, not unge.

Anna Raccoon
March 1, 2009 at 22:01

Saul’s just gone off to change into something more comfortable………

janes March 1, 2009 at 21:57

Find a duck, shoot it, unge, with your free leg in any position then get
someone to take a photo.

Saul March 1, 2009 at 21:53

Where can I find a Sonja Henie gravatar at this time of night?

janes March 1, 2009 at 21:49

Right on! I thought you’d like a new challenge Saul.

Anna Raccoon
March 1, 2009 at 21:52

I can see us going into a death spiral.

Saul March 1, 2009 at 21:47

Unravelling like a bolero

Saul March 1, 2009 at 21:41

Firemens Lift

janes March 1, 2009 at 21:39

I wouldn’t say no to a Rotational Lift either.

Anna Raccoon
March 1, 2009 at 21:41

Are we skating on thin ice here?

janes March 1, 2009 at 21:37

I prefer a Serpentine Lift if it’s all the same to you.

Anna Raccoon
March 1, 2009 at 21:38

Bosun’s Chair?

Saul March 1, 2009 at 21:33

Plus some chains and boomers and a lashing orange light…

Anna Raccoon
March 1, 2009 at 21:37

Chains and a lashing light? – sounds like something from Cynthia Payne’s
establishment.

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 21:31

I’ll give you fork-lift ……

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 21:30

Time for me to go for a while – food and all that jazz. I will try to be
back later … who knows .. I may be invisible by then ….

Saul March 1, 2009 at 21:28

I’ll bring the fork lift round the back..

Anna Raccoon
March 1, 2009 at 21:31

Nah, its not Gloria, its janes…..but then again, fork lift would be
easier.

janes March 1, 2009 at 21:28

The invisible man.

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 21:27

He’s here, we just can’t see or hear him.

janes March 1, 2009 at 21:26

He’s been at those beans I think

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 21:26

Just because my new mugshot looks like I’ve swigged the rest of Anna’s
whisky it doesn’t mean I can’t spot a wind-up when one is thrust my way under
the guise of a nice little invisibility spell. Oh no, not I!

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 21:24

Beanz Meanz Catz Bumz, more like. I’m not doing it, janes, you hear? Not
doing it!

Anna Raccoon
March 1, 2009 at 21:25

Saul? Saul? You out there Saul? I think I may need a hand to get her
home!

janes March 1, 2009 at 21:21

Try the following Gloria:

Kill a black cat and place a broad bean in each eye, one below the tail and
another in each ear. Then, bury it and water the grave every night at midnight
until the broad beans, after sprouting, are ripe. Cut off the beans..

After cutting, take the beans home and put them into your mouth one by one.
When, you think you are invisible, it is because the bean in your mouth has
the magical property. So, if you want to go into any place without being seen,
put the magic bean in your mouth.

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 21:20

double Gulp … I’m off !

janes March 1, 2009 at 21:18

Gulp …

Anna Raccoon
March 1, 2009 at 21:19

Sugar mice, sugar mice, take a deep breath…….

janes March 1, 2009 at 21:15

Have we moved onto sixes now? I can’t keep up.

Anna Raccoon
March 1, 2009 at 21:16

Two boiled mice in mine please Gloria…….

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 21:15

Now we’re all here, shall I put the cauldron on and we’ll all have a nice
brew?

Anna Raccoon
March 1, 2009 at 21:15

Hecate, Dark One, hear my plea,

Bring swift justice now, I ask of Thee!

Right the Wrongs that have been done,

Avenge me now, Oh Mighty One.

Turn misfortune back to those

Who caused my problems and my woes.

And heap upon them karmic debt

Lest they all too soon forget

Their wrongful actions, words and deeds

Don’t let them get away scot-free.

Bring them forth from where they hide,

Bring swift justice ~ wield your Scythe.

Hasten, Dark One; hear my plea~

~Do what it is I ask of Thee~

Saul March 1, 2009 at 21:14

Hexactly what I was thinking…

Anna Raccoon
March 1, 2009 at 21:15

‘Bout 2 1/2 litres………

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 21:14

hedge-piG, Anna, hedge-piG …. now, tell me, how much of that whisky have
you left?

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 21:12

I’m really harpy to see you back, Anna.

Anna Raccoon
March 1, 2009 at 21:14

I missed you all too, I did honest, I raised a glass to you, but the
waiter misunderstood and refilled it…….

Saul March 1, 2009 at 21:10

The report will be in triplicate…

Anna Raccoon
March 1, 2009 at 21:12

Hark the hedge-piglet whin’d……evening Saul……….

janes March 1, 2009 at 21:09

Thrice the brinded cat hath mew’d.
Thrice and once, the hedge-pig
whin’d.
Harpier cries:

Anna Raccoon
March 1, 2009 at 21:09

She was there with us at the start and she will be there at the
end….evening all!

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 21:07

“By the pricking of my thumbs, A vast pension this way comes…”

Who knows where the Hecate will all end?

janes March 1, 2009 at 21:04

Three kings, Three witches …

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 21:03

The Third Man Bringing Up Baby? Three Power-Blinded Meece?

Saul March 1, 2009 at 21:02

The Third Man left holding the Baby

janes March 1, 2009 at 20:55

Three musketeers?

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 20:54

The Three Stooges? The Three Amigos? The Third Man (!) ?

janes March 1, 2009 at 20:50

The three wise monkeys? Or maybe dirty rotten scoundrels.

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 20:47

Triplets, surely?

janes March 1, 2009 at 20:09

Nope, he’s Louis Walsh’s twin brother.

Gloria Smudd
March 1, 2009 at 14:12

Fred Goodwin/Roddy McDowell: separated at birth?

janes March 1, 2009 at 11:31

A radio quiz panel was asked to spot the odd man out: Gordon Brown,
Tony
Blair, Terry Wogan, Fred Goodwin, Mervyn King or Alistair Darling. The answer,
predictably you may think, was Terry Wogan – the only one with a banking
qualification.