Select Committee's Interim Report - June 2010

Pretty much agree on all counts Lou, especially the SoA which I think was badly handled all round. In fact it begs the question, how was £350,000+ spent when contributions to the legal fund were nowhere near that? Who authorised that and why? Was there a depositors agreement, an open debate, to risk that much money? If the issue was to fall on the courts to decide that is one hell of gamble to take with what is essentially our money, and when there was not by any means a 100% support of that fight against the SoA as the vote showed. Just a thought.

At the end of the day the early estimates of 85% plus returns have been the dictating factor really, nobody is going to give us any more with figures like that going round, it was always about which vehicle the payout was going to go through. A liquidation or somebody taking the debt and paying out early, which is what the SoA should have been about, but wasn't and I wonder why?

By the way I wholly agree with your point about the understanding of UK returns, and said so to Simpson way back in January 2009. I think they all played safe and then it became a noose around their collective necks when it came to what an SoA should be. It's why I felt time was needed to get clarity and not just go rushing off on a course of action. When you have a lot at stake a few months wait isn't much if it gets a result. As it turns out the SoA was far from what I think was first muted back in November 2008. Fear and loathing I suspect played their part in that.

As to the politicians I imagine the first lot were protective and the new lot not wishing to upset the applecart at the Treasury more than they have to.

Still I like to think making a pest of ourselves might at least make those who made the errors of judgement, from David Oddssen, through Hector Sants to John Aspden and Doherty feel a little bit ashamed of themselves. I can dream!!! Like you it seems I know that it may well be a waste of efforts, but I keep on just the same. I still have an issue about the lack of voice that expatriate workers have with Parliamant.

Keep it going Lou you never now somebody once erroneously said the "meek will inherit the earth", we might be the ones to prove the point!!

Steve

Yes I liked the letter Ice, I don't to be fair have a lot of time these days to view the site, but I do see your never ending dedication to the cause. Pity their are so few of us my friend!! The majority have been dealt with and have gone away it seems, I have this very conversation with our collegues in Landbanski DAG who PPDG co-operate with when we can.

I just had a marvelously vague reply from Mark Hoban MP, who "is asking his Treasury collegues for a report... and.... can't say to much at this time". Danny Alexander hasn't replied yet! Nor have Ken Clarke and Vince Cable, no doubt they will be equally vague!

Steve

I think you could say an entire islands economy rolled over Ice, a government was brought down and a lot of people lost jobs. Not sure whether or not the committee give a rats arse, but its's not a lot of good us rolling over is it. If there is any hope at all of accountability then we have to keep pestering at every level. If there is even a slight hope of somebody standing in our shoes then we keep going, small hope though that is. The point about the exposure and its interpretation was raised more than once by PPDG, if its the committees opinion that is was okay then I'll beg to differ. That's the way it goes, the IoM is being no more defensive than the UK has has been to date as far as I can see, only Iceland has savaged its own to date.

It's no worse than the UK TSC as far as I am concerned, and don't assume that the points we had weren't forcibly made.

And let's remember somebody instructed a lot of money to be spent on "legals", so as I'm comfortable that I'll get a decent, if not full return, the least some of us can do is keep pressing the case by giving our time for free.

Expat

Just for the record the Committee has been made aware of the inconsistencies in the Interim Report. There has been an exchange with them and our points were "noted" and discussed last week. Its been made clear that depositors do not accept the statements on the conduct of the regulators or the directors, I won't go into detail but if you read the report its all a bit obvious. But I am bound to say that like it or not the bulk of this falls on the light touch regulatory system used by the world of Anglo-Saxon economics, i.e. the USA, UK, IoM and Iceland, their "modus operandi" was one of keeping at arms length. Something that has now been changed and the regulators have been taking a far more active role in the banking world as you all may have noticed. At least points made about contractural obligations and proceedures between regulators has been accepted, a bit late in the day, but its a recognition of the flaws inherent in the system.

As has been pointed out on numerous occasions the Icelandic economy was in trouble at least two years before KSF went broke and the internet banking systems employed by KSF and Icesave were little more than ways of putting liquidity into the Icelandic system. Problem seems to be that no laws were broken and all there is are accusations of naivity and incompetance, matter's its pretty nearly impossible to prove.

A whitewash it may well be, but it's a fair assesment that says the FSA were deplorable and made no attempt to advise the FSC, whio in turn made no attempt to help themselves. I won't eevn bother to comment on the ineptitiude of the Icelandic authorities.

I accept that I am not best to judge this report as I am not qualified to do so. I also am very grateful for the outstanding works that have been carried out and continue to be carried out for us that still stand to lose some of our money by Ice Crusher and Gordon45. You clearly are both higher echelon individuals who are highly educated and extremely knowledgeable, which sadly for me I cannot portray to be.

But from reading this report, the whole 64 pages, it has given me some insight as far as the depth of the report has gone, into why I, or how I lost my money. I cannot call it a 'whitewash' which it maybe. As for me, I read that the IOM FSC knew back in March 2008 that the bank was at risk from Iceland's financial position as a country and that it instructed the bank to change its policy of 50% of the funds being held in Iceland. Due to the shaky,(to say the least) Iceland's financial position of being highly in too much debt. So without that direction by the FSC we as depositors would now be in a much worse position, if not for that intervention of direction.

The report states that the Isle of Man's banking system is fully dependent on other countries to hold up its banking system. Surely a country should have its own bank of last resort and not having to rely on another country for that. This should send alarm bells to anyone stupid enough to trust placing any of their money with any UK offshore bank whether that be IOM, Guernsey or any other. As it has been proven that these countries will not save you, should a bank collapse within their shores.

The report reads, that right up to a few weeks prior to the 8th October the UK FSA had a very close(Snug) relationship with the IOM FSC. But when the chips were down, the UK FSA clearly was only interested in depositors within the UK and couldn't give a hoot about any UK citizens living abroad and having to bank in one of these banana republics shaky banks. And to their amazement the FSC were dumfounded that they had not been kept informed of on-going developments with all of these Icelandic bank. It also indicated, that had it not been for the involvement of UK politicians, then the bank in the IOM would not have failed and, would have survived, as it was just hours away from being fully able to meet its cash on call demands. So did the UK know this and it that why they did what they did on the date they did. Or was that just a coincidence.

It also states, had it not been for the adverse comments of senior prominent UK politicians, the bank would have been saved and it would have been able to survive, albeit it that the UK bank of KSF would have failed.

Had the cooperation between the UK FSA and the IOM FSC been 100% it also states that the failure could have been avoided. How?

Apparently the UK did what it did because the government of Iceland had guaranteed all Icelandic depositors all of their deposits held within any of their banks. So upon hearing this the UK decided to do take action and they also confirmed that NO UK depositors would lose any of their money held on deposit too. So why did the IOM not do the same. After all, they confirmed at the UK select committee under questioning,that the IOM is responsible for its own banking system. Surely they too should have stepped up when it was necessary. Oh no after 12 months of argy bargy they decided to pay out on a DCS of up to £50,000. Which as I now think, after this last payout they would have been fully compensated for. So what has it cost the IOM government, hardly nothing I suspect, maybe a few million at most. So why do they say, we have given £150 million to help the depositors, what they should say is, "we have loaned the DCS £150 million but expect to recoup this within 12 months" which is what has happened. Now if they gave it to the JL to pay us all on top of the recovery then that would have been a good thing. But did they or will they, of course not, they are politicians and as we now know, it was a politicians that caused our bank to collapse in the first place.

So as the DAG keep saying and are trying their utmost to highlight, our plight can only been resolved by politicians not bankers. We need to embarrass and shame either the IOM political system or that of the UK to pay us all out in full. Like Germany has to all its Landsbanki savers along with Holland and all the Scandinavian countries that allowed these pirates to their shores in the first place.

I hope that this report will cause a debate here and lets get it out to the world and lets keep hammering away until such times as we are given help from these politicians that are supposed to help us keep our money safe for our retirement. As of course their retirement fund is well protected by the people. Shame of the IOM and the UK governments.

Comment? Whitewash.