Why am I paying for Icelandic excuses to go whaling?
Now I have heard everything. It seems that I am indirectly personally underwriting Icelandic whaling whilst the ‘credit crunch’ bites. Today’s Guardian (UK) reports that Britain’s building societies are ‘up in arms over the bills they face for bailing out banks that collapsed last year, and are urging their members to get involved by writing to their MP and the chancellor’.
Now I am a member of a building society and it would seem that my building society is one of those having to underwrite (‘cough up’ as the Guardian reports) as much as £30 per member. Amongst the building societies affected, the tiny Ecology building society, which has 9000 members and specializes in giving environmentally friendly mortgages, faces an estimated bill of £270,000.
Icesave and Kaupthing Edge, both UK divisions of Icelandic banks with thousands of savers, collapsed last year. UK banks and building societies, not the taxpayer, are footing the bail out tab for these banks. However, as most of us have accounts with these institutions, it seems we are paying. The Guardian reports that the [UK] Government has made loans totaling almost £20bn to the Financial Services Compensation Scheme so it could make payouts to customers of Icesave, and is charging interest on these.
So whilst the Icelandic Government contemplates suing the British Government for the problems in its own banking systems, we are expected to pay for those ‘mistakes’.
At the same time the Icelandic Government is promoting the resumption of commercial whaling because of the financial difficulties it has brought upon itself.
Something does not feel right here.
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