Monopoly

Vince Cable (I keep wanting to call him Vince Clark, which then leads to the terrifying image of him with an enormous New Romatic-style fringe wiggling slightly as he plays keyboards) has been appointed Business Secretary, with responsibility for sorting out the banks.

Vince often fails to correct people who suggest that he saw the banking crisis coming. He didn't. He warned extensively that levels of personal debt were unsustainable (they were) but like everyone else was taken unawares by the impact of the hideous rapacity of Britain's banking sector.

Cable (or possibly Clarke's) appointment as chief of all things banking does at least mean that the Tory "victory" has not had the one unbearable aspect that it seemed to - that the banking crisis had handed power to.... the banks. Cable is not a Tory and comes from a very different bankground (er, big oil - ed), and this at least shows Cameron's willingness to distance himself from the pinstriped mob that gave him his votes in the first place.

So perhaps we'll see the major rule change to the eternal game of Monopoly, and see the Banks becoming part of the board rather than the mysterious power that oversees it.

Or not. We'll see if we ever pass Go again.

entry for May 5 2010