Commons Committee Comedy, starring the Diamond Geezer

I usually avoid watching puffed-up, pompous politicians strutting their stuff in Committee but the Diamond Show was compulsive viewing. Since Dave had already pronounced judgement before any evidence had been heard, it was bound to be a combination of ‘Have I got News for You’ and ‘Big Brother’, and I was not disappointed.

As I anticipated when the inquiry was set-up, Bob was going to put a bit of stick about regarding other banks, the B of E, Treasury mandarins and politicians. Like Dr Heinz Kiosk of Utrecht (whom God preserve) Bob maintained that ‘We are all guilty’, his eyes revolving. He has probably done for the ambitions of one B of E big-shot to get the top job when Cock-up King retires to spend more time with his money. There will be some very worried civil servants and politicians of all stripes busily wiping their computer files right now. He accused nobody, but there were some slippery insinuations of complicity.

I believe that Committees work on the basis of each member being allocated a set ration of questions.

A woman member used one of her scarce resource to ask ‘Do you occupy a parallel universe?’ Bob couldn’t answer that one because, like the rest of us, he had no idea which planet she occupied. A Labour nonentity of a bruiser called Mann asked if Bob should have the founding principles of Barclays ‘honesty, integrity, plain dealing’ tattooed on his knuckles, he no doubt having Googled them earlier that morning. Another question wasted.

This was not an inquiry. It was a piece of grandstanding to the voters, not that many would have been watching the comedy hour from Westminster.

Unfortunately for them, Bob has already shot their fox by resigning, so there could be no cries of ‘Off with his head!’

But it was pretty plain that Lloyds and RBS, both nationalised banks, were at it. Most hilarious of all were accusations of sharp practice by Barclays in using accounting legerdemain to keep assets off-balance sheet. Just like Gordon Brown’s PFI, you mean? This enabled Barclays to re-finance and avoid taking taxpayers’ money. In their world, that’s really bad!

He was totally unconvincing when he averred that hanky-panky had been going on for nearly 4 years, starting before he became CEO. But that he only realised what was going on a  little over a month ago. The twin response to this should have been ‘Pull the other one’ and ‘What the hell were the Treasury, the B of E and the FSA doing all this time?’

‘So what became of it at last?’ quoth Little Peterkin’.

Between obfuscation and a comic display of political ineptitude, I give it a draw!