kernow

I saw Nigel on the politics show today. As per usual he spoke a lot of sense both on the present financial crisis and immigration! No doubt there will be several on this forum who will disagree even if they didn't see the programme!

SomersetYokel

By chance I saw this programme. Two points:

What is NFs source for his statement, " that HMT were instructed by the EU to demand a 5 year moratorium on dividends from HBOS and RBS"?

On immigration and EU citizens coming to work in UK

Jon Sopel, But UK citizens can work in the EU like you work in Brussels!

NF:"Errrrr I dont think that is a very apt comparison.....and I would rather not go to work there"

Well Nigel why not put your money where your mouth is and not go to Brussels and give all that EU loot to UKIP and work in the UK to get us out of the EU

Sorry Kernow but that was a poor performance. In an election campaign the other parties will use that sort of superficial unsupported statement on HMT plus his inconsistency on EU cross border workers to destroy us electorally

Niall Warry

Not true I for one have never disputed his media skills it's his inability to administer the Party and stamp out internal corruption that gets on my goat

under my rock

I gather the official source for this statement was Jonathan Todd, who is the official spokesman for the EU Commission, speaking on behalf of EU Commissioner for Competition Neelie Kroes.

The quote previously appeared on Page 6 of the Daily Telegraph Business Section this Friday morning and was of course completely ignored by the main parties as they don't like to admit they are dancing to Brussels' tune.

Once again only Nigel and UKIP are telling the Britrish people what is really going on.

Well Done Nigel!

European Citizen

The EU's reasoning for such a move was so that shareholders did not benefit from government aid, and that it would provide an incentive for the banks to pay bank taxpayers' cash as soon as possible. I think that's reasonable.

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Working towards a country called "Europe".

Mark Croucher

I await the post where you say that you stand corrected and Nigel was correct after all.

Jeff

Farage was NOT his usual self,if he was he would have mentioned UKIP at least once,but he never did.

He's now an advert for being an EU Reformist.

Just wait and see.

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SomersetYokel

Dear Under my Rock,

I thank you for pointing this out to me. I checked but it is not on p6 of my DT Business, Friday Oct 17 or in Saturdays however I did find on the DT website

Banks in bail-out scheme cannot pay dividends for five years under EU law - Telegraph

This states

"However, the European Commission has ruled that the bailout can only proceed if dividends are banned until the preference shares are repaid. Jonathan Todd, a spokesman for the Commission, said: "The Commission wanted to ensure that there was a strong incentive for the banks to repay the state as quickly as possible."

This is not the same as a 5 year ban although the UK prefs have a 5 year repayment covenant. It is however financial common sense as preference shares dividends at 12% are very expensive compared to equity dividends of say 5%. I suspect the Swiss banks, like the US banks, are not paying anything like 12% on their prefs, probably less than 5%. The Swiss are capitalists and Darling Brown are left wing bash the banks socialists. The choice between repaying prefs early and paying some equity dividend is more even for the Swiss. HMT has now back tracked and said that dividend payments can be restarted before all the prefs are repaid.

Its really down to the level of interest on the pref shares - a UK decision plus HMT's latest variation. No one is quite certain where we are on this least of all the banks.

NF would sound more authoritative and be taken more seriously if he quoted his source and avoided over-simplification. It is always dangerous in financial matters. Certainly the EU had some influence but the decision was largely home grown.

michael mcgough

"NF would sound more authoritative and be taken more seriously if he quoted his source and avoided over-simplification."

He is reaching out to the masses not merchant bankers.

SomersetYokel

Not if his assertions can be so easily shown to be naive. This was an HMT decision in its most important components. The EU influence was small and plain common sense.

Overall the EU/ECB have handled the credit crunch much better than the UK. Not a good issue for UKIP to go on. Its as simple as that as NF likes to say.