Wellllll...now I've heard everything....(again)

What a sickening image to wake up to on a Saturday morning!

Wayne Swan, gracefully winging his way through an interview(Press release?) designed to give the impression that the new Government is

-Cracking down on capitalist pig dog banks
-Doing DYNAMIC things to whack them into shape
-Protecting we the poor mortgage burdened workers

well that was the 'impression'...(to that segment of the population on the left of the 'moron' dividing line.)

ACTION PLAN...
-We will ENSURE that 'information' about what banks are charging is freely available!(wow)
-We will make it EASIER for people to "know" what banks are charging in entry/exit fees.
-We will 'ask' the regulator to 'look at' entry exit fees.
-We will make sure banks pass all your information to a different bank you choose.(I'm blown away)
-We will continue to foam at the mouth like this until we feel you actually believe that we are 'doing' something 'for you'.

THE REALITY.

NEWSREADER "How MUCH will customers be saving"?
SWAN "What we are about is ......"

NEWSREADER "But Mr Swan.. in DOLLARS AND CENTS...how much will customers likely save through these initiatives"

SWAN "Labor will do all it can to ...."

NEWSREADER (looking sideways almost) "Will customers actually save anything" ?

SWAN.. blah blah..yada yada...Labor good.. coalition bad.. pigs, dogs.. blah blah..labor will.. labor this...labor that ..yada yada..

COME ON! Wayne.. is insulting the intelligence of all Australians a good way to begin a government ? God help us if that mentality is running the finance of the country..*shudder*

QUESTION.. "do you feel insulted by this exercise in public relations/spin" ?

Cracking down on banks if only that were true. Spin is rife on both sides of politics and the moron line is a grey area.

The problem is even if governments could encourage banks to reduce or eradicate fees to make changing banks easier and in turn increase competition, how many of us would make the change given all the things we would have to do. Close down all the other accounts, stop the direct debits and change credit cards just to name a few.

And just when we find a bank with reduced fees and lower interest rates or higher interest rates on savings, the playing field changes and we would have to keep doing it all over again. If the aim is to keep the B**s honest we are all going to be very busy. :)

In our dreams.

Face the truth and stop whingeing. Politicians can do nothing about our banks. They are as much their victims, albeit better paid, as we are. The last politician to try to control the banking industry was Ben Chiffley and the banks united to destroy his chance at re-election. If you want to live in a capitalist society, you have to put up with the cost. User pays, after all. If you want to live in Cuba, you will have access to a good health service but you won't have all the new toys we can buy in our society and you won't be able to let off steam freely and meaninglessly on the internet, like we can now.

Hi Henry and Pelican

actualllly...... the last time banks were controlled by the government was before the CBA was privatized!
It was a peoples bank..and people friendly..I remember it. When I went there I actually felt they were trying to help me... not hit me in the hip pocket from every angle.

NO...I don't want to live in a 'capitalist' society.... I neither want to live in a SOCIALIST society..I want to live in a balanced middle ground.

Sadly, whenever one bleets about something like a "peoples bank".... the howls and cries go up from what one is tempted to believe are the 'paid hounds of the major commercial banks'....

Of all the things we need a 'peoples' one of.. HEALTH and BANK are they.

So.. now..along with my manifest of:

1/ NO HATE SPEECH which calls for violence against members of our own society for saying things others don't like. (but passionate critical speech is most welcome)

I now add.

2/ PEOPLES BANK. (that will SURELY keep the other B*stards honest)

3/ PEOPLES HEALTH.

We absolutely need those 3 things for a good happy society.

Aaah..the vision is becoming clearer.

You know..the ONLY thing which would be hurt by having a peoples bank is the PROFIT margins of the big commercial ones.. and that.. has pretty much ZIPPO effect on me.. I don't have any of their sullied shares.

According to this morning's newspaper, The Age, Sat. Feb. 9th 2008 -
"Fees charged to people who switch their home loan mortgages will be reviewed, in a move by the Rudd Government to protect consumers facing rising interest rates.

A plan approved yesterday will make it easier to switch direct payments to new accounts - a hassle consumer advocates said was one of the biggest impediments to competition in banking.

The plan, announced by Treasurer Wayne Swan, is designed to be a tough stance against the banks in the wake of increases in rates that are unrelated to official rises.

It comes as the National Australia Bank yesterday announced it would raise rates on its standard variable mortgages by 0.29 of a percentage point - more than the 0.25 of a point announced by the Reserve Bank on Tuesday.

The Government is anxious to demonstrate it is doing all it can to ensure that home buyers are able to shop for the best possible deals.

"There are currently too many administrative and other obstacles Australians confront if they want to change banks," Mr Swan said, after meeting financial regulators.

The Australian Securities and Investments Commission will conduct the review of exit fees and will also manage a one-stop complaints hotline for disgruntled banking customers.

Mr Swan said the watchdog would be, " shining a light on fees, putting downward pressure on them."

Exit fees on mortgages charged by the main banks start at $700, with some lenders charging a percentage of the outstanding loan, which could be thousands.

A spokesperson for Choice, formerly the Australian Consumer's Association, welcomed the Government's initiatives. "Changing debits has been one of the biggest hurdles to consumers. We have been saying for years banks needed to do something about this." Choice said consumers' use of direct debits had doubled since 2000, now averaging 1.8 million transactions a day.

Link: www.understandingmoney.gov.au

I am probably a bit like you David BOAZ in wanting a middle ground (if I have understood you correctly) - neither too rampantly capitalistic (while recognising we live in a capitalistic world) but not something verging on Communism. We are a social democracy but we are moving more and more to the right or towards the new Conservatism which has plagued the USA.

I remember a time when even more Conservative (Coalition) governments operated under free education, socialised medicine and YES...publicly owned utilities and communications, a Bank and an Airline. Governments of both flavours managed to do this without fear of being labelled mad reds or left wing loonies. We don't pay for our schools and this is 'socialised education'. Don't be scared by the word Socialism.

I hate labels really because we become too bogged down with the labels and blind to what might really work. Terms like Left and Right under our system is really meaningless and terms like Regulation and De-regulation are probably more apt in our 'economy focussed' world.