Barclays

Boris may be under fire for his London bike scheme – what with  soaring costs, declining use and Barclays cutting their sponsorship. But not everyone is so critical. The iconic blue bikes have achieved international fame, not least in Gambia. Probably tricky to find a docking station in the desert though. Via Oxfam Campaigns and Policy Director Ben Phillips.

Why not tax the bejesus out of the City and tighten regulation? Yes, the bankers will moan — but it’s not as if they will go abroad. The tax rate may be low in Zug, but do our pinstriped friends want to actually live there? The City’s elite have their kids in British schools, the time zone is right for business and the global phenomenon of Planet London has attractions that outweigh marginal tax rates. So let bankers moan: they’ll stay. This is, more or less, the argument that you hear from MPs on all benches as they take a carving knife to the golden goose that is the City

Barclays bank has opened a charm offensive, hosting an autumn drinks party for assorted hacks at its Mayfair offices. Insiders claim that it’s ‘a very British affair’ at the bank these days, with a new regime at the top following Bob Diamond’s departure. Indeed, even the more subtle traces of Diamond have been eradicated. It was a no tie affair in Mayfair, which meant that there was not a lime green silk number – Diamond’s trademark – in sight. It was not always so. I hear that, when the former chief executive was in town, ambitious tyros would whip their own lime green neckwear out of the desk drawer in an attempt to impress

The Osborne/Balls clash today was one of the most brutal I have seen in parliament. Osborne, leaning across the despatch box, mockingly enquired, ‘who was the City Minister when the Libor scandal happened? Put your hand up if you were the City Minister?’ Balls looked increasingly cross as Osborne continued down this path, demanding that the shadow Chancellor take ‘personal responsibility’ for the failures of the regulatory regime. Labour argues that the public are turned off by this kind of stuff; that they want to see answers rather than point-scoring. Even Darling — hardly an admirer of a man who coveted his job for so long — offered a partial

The Libor scandal is yet another blow to the reputation of the City of London. Alistair Darling may have been right when he told George Osborne that we’re ‘kidding ourselves if we think this was the only country where this happened.’ But there’s no getting away from the fact that an uncomfortably large number of financial scandals start in London.     In the Commons, Osborne seemed keen to move towards a more American-style system of regulation with more prosecuting powers for the FSA and new criminal offences. But he was also keen to make a political point, this happened under the last government and a regulatory system set up

In a speech tomorrow, Ed Miliband will call for ‘one nation banking’. The Labour leader will argue that banks have to show that they are part of the society in which they operate.   But, perhaps, most interesting is Miliband’s point — previewed in the political column this week — that the behaviour and pay structures of banks are fair game for parliament because they are ‘either directly or indirectly supported by the taxpayer.’ Labour will, indeed, propose a vote on the broader bonus culture. The clear target of this motion will be Barclays and Bob Diamond.   Before the bailouts it would have been easy to dismiss all this