At the Northumberland Credit Union AGM in February, a Board recommendation that no dividend should be paid was accepted unanimously. This wasn't because the credit union was struggling - in fact it is thriving with both total savings and total loans at an all-time high. No - the Board decided simply that because the credit union is still dependent on grant-funding (a little under £6k a year) - it was inappropriate to pay out.
It makes a nice contrasts with those banks which accepted Government handouts and subsidies - and then felt it was OK to pay bonuses to their staff.
The Green Party has endorsed the 'Robin Hood' tax campaign - taxing bank transactions at 25p per £10,000 to provide a ringfenced revenue stream. However - we woukd like to bring in much stronger policies. We want to separate high street banking from merchant banking, and from currency and commodity speculation - and we want a 'Tobin' tax which also taxes banking transactions, but designed deliberately to discourage financial speculation. Like all real Green taxes - it is intended to change behaviour more than raise revenue.
No comments:
Post a Comment