Don't Bank On It

The Midland Bank was where the bank account was opened around sixty years ago in London after the Army decided that on the whole it was safer for the nation for me to be a civilian.  When I cashed my first cheque it was off to the nearest barber at the Savoy Hotel for a haircut.

The barber, looking at my flowing locks asked me if the cut was because I was going into the services.  He was surprised when told it was the reverse.  A human right to hair was one of the disputes I had with my military superiors.  Now a student, short hair was needed for me to express my individuality.

The Midland Bank was with me through studies, work, marriage and mortgages and all the rest into retirement and through the ups and downs and more downs of getting through the years.  Then in the late 1990's it was taken over and then renamed.  HSBC it became and it was not long before I was calling it Shanghai Lil's.

For this naming see "Footlight Parade" in Wikipedia, the 1933 movie with James Cagney, picture above.  This was because when entering the local branch instead of doing the basic job of managing the account or moving money I was accosted by attractive forward young ladies making me offers which they claimed were too good to refuse.

After my Chief Executive running the figures it seemed they would be better off than me at the end of it if they earned their share of the takings.  So it has not come as much of a surprise to learn that my bank has been at the deep, muddy and murky end of world finance.  There has been a great deal in the media about all this.

This letter to David Cameron from Rowan Bosworth-Davies will do for me along with his two previous posts of Tuesday 17th and Saturday 14th of this month.  They are all a little on the long side but easy and plain reading if you have the time. He does have expertise on the subject of criminality.

Shanghai Lil was also the name of a B-29 Bomber of the US 444th Bombardment Wing in the Far East in World War II.  One thing for sure, they did not do half as much damage as the HSBC bank has done in the economic financial warfare of the early 21st Century.