The FT reported this morning that:
Gordon Brown's focus on "red herring" issues such as bank bonuses and tax havens risks turning next month's summit of the Group of 20 nations into a catastrophe that fails to deal with the recession, the CBI employers' group has warned.
Martin Broughton, CBI president and British Airways chairman, said the London summit should focus on a global stimulus and undertakings to resist protectionism.
You always know that the government is getting close to the cause of a problem when the CBI says things like that.
This afternoon the TUC responded. Brendan Barber said:
Reckless bonuses for top bankers, tax haven secrecy and business opposition to regulation were all key ingredients in the financial crisis that is now causing people up and down the country to lose their jobs and homes.
Business lobbyists who oppose action on these at the G20 run the risk of looking like advocates for the super-rich rather than ordinary businesses who are as much victims of the recession as their employees.
Such calls are completely out of touch with the public mood as shown by the big support that is growing for the Put People First demonstration in the run up to the London G20 summit.
Brendan is right.
Isn’t it extraordinary? The Lib Dems and TUC are now the voices of reason in the UK. The CBI are seen as the mavericks.
Times are changing.
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the TUC haven’t got a clue – good to see that some things don’t change!
Richard, I don’t know whether you prepared a response for the FT on this, but someone reminded me yesterday of the significance of Granite in the Northern Rock disaster and the fact that most of the shadow banking operations are located in secrecy jurisdictions. (Don’t mean to tell grandmother how to suck eggs!).