Whilst Spain gets ready to use public money to bailout Bankia from reckless overexposure to the troubled property sector, it seems to me that the very people that have caused the economic crisis are now starting to fret. It is clear from the change of government in France and Greece that parts of Europe are refusing to swallow the nasty medicine prescribed for us all as the solution to problems caused by greed.
The financial services and banking industry (a euphemism for those who produce nothing and rely on productivity of those that actually do) are now telling us what it is is that we should do to put things right. My question is, put things right for the benefit of who?
As a person who ran a small business in the UK for over 16 years, I consider myself to be a natural conservative. However, we no longer have a pro business pro development culture in either Spain or the UK. We simply have self serving politicians, disconnected from the real world who tell us that austerity measures are the only solution to the economic crisis which threatens to overwhelm Europe.
I genuinely believe that sustained austerity will not deliver the rescue from a sustained downturn that we all desire. I am not surprised that the idiots that caused the crisis are incapable of visualizing a viable solution. If they had the slightest foresight or competence at all, the banking crisis could have been completely avoided. So why is it that we are supposed to listen to them now?
From my own perspective, the end to the current recession can only come about as a result of genuine economic growth. The type of growth that is not going to be delivered by people who are struggling to pay for school books, worrying about lack of a sustainable pension when they retire or concerned that as they get older and find themselves in need of healthcare, that it will no longer be available.
One UK entrepreneur told me that he was not even certain that it was possible to set-up a profitable business in Europe any more. Business confidence is for the time being lost. It will not quickly return whilst the very people who once made our nations great are force fed austerity.