Pensions, peers and profiteering

What a mess Gordon Brown and his pals are in. From trying to take back the pension which Lord Myner, the City Minister approved, to stripping Fred Goodwin of the knighthood which Gordon Brown personally recommended. And of course if someone is have their pension taken off them for the mess they have caused, then why isn't Brown giving his up? There's a lot of nasty scapegoating going on at the moment. Goodwin is a key architect of one bank's demise. But casino capitalism was hardly the design of just one bank or one chief exec.

What about the Halifax Bank of Scotland merger with Lloyds TSB? A shotgun wedding with Gordon Brown as the officiating meenister. Is the ex-CEO of HBOS being chased for his pension? And the CEO before Hornby, Sir James Crosby? A special adviser to Broon, deputy chair of the financial services regulator and now a man who's reputation is in tatters.

So before there are lots of posts reminding us all of how Tommy Sheridan forewarned of these ills before he was out of nappies, the reality is too many people endorsed the climate of wreckless financial gambling as consumers and policy-makers, myself included.

However, Labour's hypocrisy doesn't stop there. Take the case of Adam Ingram, MP for East Kilbride and environs. Not satisfied with being a highly paid Minister for most of the 10 years of New Labour in power, he now is taking lucrative salaries from defence-related companies. A whopping quarter of a million pounds of year. But it does look like he isn't long for the House of Commons. (No doubt a seat is being warmed for him in the House of Lords where his 'consulting' skills will be even further rewarded like his chums, Lord Moonie (another former Defence Minister) and Lord Foulkes (former International Aid Minister).

However, today's story that his constituency assistant is reportedly writing letters to the press in the name of a local party member to support Mr Ingram is way out of line. More so when we learn that the said constituency assistant, Cllr Michael McCann, is the front runner to succeed Ingram as the Labour candidate at the General Election. Nice to know that the sneaky underhand tricks academy is hard at work in Labour circles.