Lloyds! Do any in England now believe they live in a Democracy

The Independent this morning, linked here, reports that a trillion dollars worth of foreign funds were withdrawn from the City of London between the spring and the end of of last year and that the run could now become a rout of confidence. It also has the following: This week, Lloyds became the latest bank to approach the Government for more assistance. A deal was agreed last night for the Government to insure about £260bn of assets in return for a stake of up to 75 per cent in the bank. The slide in sterling – it has shed a quarter of its value since mid-2007 – has been both cause and effect of the run on London, seemingly becoming a self-fulfilling phenomenon. The danger is that the heavy depreciation of the pound could become a rout if confidence completely evaporates. Why has this act of destruction against a viable bank been perpetrated by the Government with no calling to account. On 18th September last year, when the merger was first leaked I blogged (here) as follows: If the problem is mistrust by bankers of one another, absorbtion of one bank by another will surely merely shift the target of others mistrust.... If the takeover of Abbey National by Lloyds a while back was halted as not in the public interest how come the takeover of HBOS by Lloyds is justified in the public interest?... Re-establishing trust in Scotland would surely be best attained by separating the old Bank of Scotland from the Halifax disaster area... Now it is being announced on the BBC that Lloyds has become a government subsidiary. The shareholders have had their assets effectively stolen, although foolishly all along the way they kowtowed to the Government's demands, but under what pressure by the Government upon the larger institutional investors who alone could have swung the act of plunder! Can higher prescription charges only be applied in one part of a Democracy? Can the Government steal your bank? The answer to both questions should be No. Yet it is happening.... Can England still be a democracy?? How can the answer possibly be Yes even had legislative power not been passed to the EU? Why has the Opposition throughout this period not Opposed? (Update 0921 GMT the Government stake in Lloyds is now reported by Sky as 77%, another 2% loss over breakfast for the shareholders since The Independent went to press. What a Farce!) (Update at midday - at least one other commentator agrees on this, read here but Gerald Warner in his Telegraph blog is forced to ask in the title "Is it just me?" Just us it seems - unbelievably the Conservative Home blog is debating as its main topic whether the Tories are still right wing!!)